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®(lir*0 ^ttt: 



OB, 



' HISTORICAL NOTICES 



RELA.TINO TO 



t 



Cj)urc|)^attiS. 



BY MRS. STONE, 



AUIH0BS8S OV ' HI8X0BY 09 THB ABT OF ITBSDLBWOBK,' ' ENOLDSH 

society/ btc. 



Awhile let me jour patience craye, * 
There is no teaoher like the Graye. 

BaptUUrjf, 



• 1 



LONDON: . . 
* , JOHN W. PAEKEE AND- SON, WEST STEAND; ! . ' 

; \ • 1858. 

l^^tOkor temrvet th&rigkf qf Trantlation.'] 









INSCBIBED 



WITH AFFEOTIOKA-TE BE8PE0T 



■ *\ 



TO 






^ »■•■ 



LAD! WILLIAM 







,WOOD. 



PREFACE. 



rPHIS book is not the hastily-penned effusion of 
-*- morbid sentiment: it is a careful collation of 
a portion of the varied notes accumulated during 
many years of a very retired, and oftentimes lonely 
life. It is moreover, of necessity, the last publication 
I can make which shall involve any additional read- 
ing or research. 

I had projected, and indeed had prepared, a more 
extended work; but on consideration I have ex- 
punged many notes and sketches which, though 
strictly true, and consonant with the general tenor 
of the volume, partook more of the nature of per- 
sonal reminiscence than of historical record. 

What is thus lost in variety is gained in brevity, 
and, perhaps, in unity, though I frankly admit the 
work to be ' miscellaneous and wayward.' 

The subject may not seem at first sight a very 
attractive one. But if it be a little startling to fii^id 
so many pages devoted to 'graves, and worms, and 
epitaphs,' it may reassure us to call to mind that 

62 



HOVMPSi 



vi PREFACE. 

EPITAPHS point to a future hope; that worms 
loosen, and thereby tend to irrigate, the soil for the 
bursting forth of flowers ; and that GRAVES are the 
'footprints of angels/ 

It is fair to state that these Chapters — penned 
without extraneous aid or domestic reference — are 
written speciaUy for my own sex. 

Such as it is, I commend this book in the selfsame 
words which, long years ago, I attached to my first 
publication : — 

* I oflfer it in the hope that it will cause amuse- 
ment to some, gratification of perhaps a higher order 
to others, and offence — ^as I trust and believe — to 

none/ 

Elizabeth Stone. 

8L Annes Road, Wandsworth, 
March, 1858. 



J • iM> t '^ •' * 



CONTENTS, 



CHAPTEK I. 



ANCIENT BURIAL. 



Introduction— Subject of universal interest — Tradition regard- 
ing Adam's grave — References to the burial customs of many 
nations — Last instances of Cremation — Jewish sepulchres — 
Duty of burial exemplified from Holy Writ — ^Anecdote of St. 
Louis — ^Pollution to touch a corpse — Swedish superstition — 
Literdict — Sacrifices of human beings and of animals at tombs 
^Funeral of a Scythian king — Custom of Guiana — ^Barrows 
the most ancient tombs — found everywhere — Religious rites 
of ancient Britons — Burial of the poor and the rich — Hubba*s 
barrow in England — Cairn of the last King of Cumber- 
land pp. I — a8 



CHAPTER n. 



CHRISTIAN BURIAL. 



Contrast of pagan and Christian rites — and hopes — Christian 
looks to death as leading to 'home' — poor especially — Illus- 



VIU CONTENTS. 

tration from life — Funeral of Monica, St. Augustine's mother 
— ^No certainty of immortality to the pagan— Opinions of 
Socrates and Cicero — Full assurance to the Christian — ^Duchess 
of Somerset an example — Our anticipations of a future life — 
Christian doctrine of resurrection full of joy to pagans — 
—especially to slaves — Its great influence when newly pro- 
mulged — Early Martyrs: Ignatius, Polycarp, Perpetua — 
First Christians compelled to hury in secresy from inhumanity 
of pagan persecutors — afterwards hy day with lights and 
triumphant Psalms — Constantine allows free privilege of 
burial — Reverent care of the body — ^Remains of Polycarp — 
Departure from first simplicity of funeral attire — Parabolani, 
Ac. — Watching of corpse— Detailed account of early Christian 
funeral service pp. 29 — 61 



CHAPTER III. 

INTERMENT CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 

Intramural interment forbidden by the Romans — Graves of 
Saints Peter, Paul, Cyprian — Various catacombs — St. Jerome's 
description of one — Ostentation in funeral to be avoided — 
Illustrations and examples — Humility taught by the Church 
—and 'wise* burials ordained — ^Modern 'fopperies* of inter- 
ment — ^Extramural interment — Burying in houses or gardens 
— Principle of Church ever against interment within its walk 
— Practice prevailed and gained ground — Many canons against 
it — to whom permitted — ^Varying scale of honour in position 



CONTENTS. IX 

of tomb : Chancel, Nave, Porch — Bur jing-place tmder St. 
Paul's — Atrium or cemetery — Churches built over graves of 
venerated persons — ^Archbishop Cuthbert*s device and secret 
interment pp. 62 — 83 



CHAPTER IV. 

nn^ERHENT — CHURCHES AND CRUBORY AJaLUB^COnHmisd. 

Universal desire to be buried in holy earth — Particular instance 
— Burying at tombs of martyrs — St. Augustine's opinion 
thereon — ^Memorials or monuments— Graves of Nelson and 
Bunyan — To whom interment in consecrated ground is for- 
bidden — Crowding and desecration of city churchyards- 
Burial-places universally reverenced — Illustrations &om various 
countries — Consecration of churchyards — A form thereof 
(Note) — Constant care for the Church in Anglo-Saxon laws^ 
Appeals to Rome not thought of — ' Precedents and Proceed- 
ings' — Illustrative extracts therefrom — Folding sheep in 
church — Sleeping in diurch — Young girl summoned for 
sitting in the pew with her mother instead of at pew- 
door, &c., <&c pp. 83 — 103 



CHAPTER V. 

INTEBMENT — CEMETERIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. 

' Quality Vault' — Fashionable cemeteries — Care of body — Reve- 
rence for family burying-place — and desire for interment 



! 

i X CONTENTS. 



therein — Lady Grisell Baillie — ^Instances from Scripture — 
Approach to a fashionable cemetery — ^Bad taste in plants and 
flowers -— Disorderly state of graves — less noticeable in a 
churchyard — Laktebkbs des MosTS-^Especial grave sought 
— Immortelle wreaths — all by one maker — Sepulchral 
chambers — ^Vaults— Love for country churchyard— Beattie — 
Allan Cunningham pp. 104 — 125 



CHAPTER VI. 



INTEBHENT — CEMETERIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES— 

continued. 

Burial-vaults first used by heathen— Catacombs of Bome and 
various other places — First Christian Churches in Catacombs 
—Tombs of the Martyrs — Women admitted only once a year 
—Antiseptic vaults — Certain soils and climates preserve 
bodies from decay — Charnel-house usual appendage to a 
church — almost universal m Brittany — many in England — 
Crypt at Hythe and at Folkestone — Catacombs of Pahis — 
origin of— their formation and consecration — Removal of 
bones from the Cemetery of the Lmocents — Desecration during 
the Bevolution — Completion — Adifocibb and Mummt 

POWDEB pp. 126 — 150 



CHAPTER VIL 

THE CROSS. 

A cross always erected in churchyards — St. Mary Magdalene- 
Cross originally used only as an emblem — Moral influence of 



CONTENTS. XI 

the Cross — Used as boundary marks — Cross in Eyam Church- 
yard — ^Neville's Cross — Cross on Field of Cressy {Note) — 
Crosses in Cornwall — First Christian emblem — Holy Standard 
at Jerusalem — Reverence attached to a Cross — ^Wom by Cru- 
saders — ^Earliest use of upright Crosses — First Christian Cross 
in England — Carved on gravestones — Privileged as Sanctuary 
— Where usually placed — Cholera Cross — Calvaries in France 
— Description of several — ^Weeping Cross — Cross of Penance- 
Memorial Crosses — Queen Eleanor's Crosses — ^Use of Cross 
— Cross at Cheapside — at Charing — Wayside Crosses — Hood^s 
Lines on a Cross pp. 151 — 169 



CHAPTER YIIL 

TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 



Ancient tombs — Westminster Abbey — a show-place of Monu- 
ments — incongruous appearance of them — The coffin -lid the 
earliest monument — elevated by degrees — Table-tomb — 
Various adornments — Effigies — Emblematic distinctions — 
Skeletons on tombs — Poetical emblems — Soul represented — 
Last recumbent effigy — ^Most fitting attitude — Change in 
monuments and effigies— Small men and women {Note) — 
Contrast between Westminster and Tintem — Poetical descrip- 
tion applicable to Tintem — ^Founder of Tintem — ^Visit to 
Tintem (Note) — Triangular tombstones — ^Tomb of a woman 
therein — Similar privilege to Cecily Sandford — ^Vows of 
chastity'— Inscriptions on tombs — Interment in bare ground 
—Manufacture of stone coffins — Places for baptism and burial 
— Dr. Bathurst's lidless coffin — Disuse of coffins — Lords St. 



Xll CONTENTS. 

Clair — King Arthur's coffin — ^Epitaphs — a few ancient ones 
—their hamble tone — Decrees to correct bad taste in them — 
Addison's satire — Two epitaphs pp. 170—201 



CHAPTER IX. 

RELICS, SHRIKES, AKD PILORIMAQE. 

Anecdote of St. Cyprian — Origin of reverence for relics, and 
cause of their multiplication — Anecdote of St. Germain — 
Touching to remains — Harold's oath on the concealed relics — 
Belies given to Westminster — Relic, a Sanctuary — carried in 
cases of gold — Cross Gneyth — Belies on St. Paul's steeple — 
Shrines for relics — of two sorts — remarkable ones — ^immense 
riches accumulated thereon — Thomas a Becket — his burial — 
Miracles at his tomb— Devotees to his shrine — Henry the 
King and other pilgrims — The French King and his offering 
— ^Translation of Becket's remains — ^Exhibition of offerings — 
Prodigious amount of offerings at this shrine — the finest 
jewel in the world amongst them — Custos Feretri — Pil- 
6BIHAGE — ^usual from the earliest times — Philse — Mount 
Hor — Mamre — Mecca — the Jordan — Jerusalem — first 
sight of — enthusiasm of all visitors — Humility of Crusaders 
— Pilgrimage a fashion — also a valuable aid to the Church — 
Advantage of pilgrimage — Care for pilgrims — Pilgrimage to 
Rome — Pilgrimage not lightly undertaken — Preparation for 
benediction of a pilgrim — Spenser's description of a pilgrim — 
Scott's of a palmer — Yarious shrines — Difficulties of travel — 
Sufferings of Jerusalem pilgrims at Jaffa — Description of 



INSCEIBED 



WITH AFFECTIONATE RESPECT 









TO 






•f , l> I. 



■•■;v "^ 



LADY WiLLUM 



'1^^ 



^•> 




v\fOOD. 



CONTENTS. 



regarding flowers — Bay-tree — 'Maiden crants' — Rosemary — 
Boses — Flower memorial in Bristol Cathedral — Funeral plants 
in Norway {Note) pp. 244 — 276 



CHAPTER XL 

8AKCTUABY. 



Under the Mosaical dispensation — Especially adapted to Eastern 
habits and customs — Usage gained in all countries (Note) — 
Obtained in our Church by traditional usage — a salutary insti- 
tution — its advantages despite abuses — St. Chrysostom a pro- 
moter thereof — a powerful engine of the Church — First law 
sanctioning it — Highly privileged in England — Sanctuary at 
Hexham — Occasional violations of Sanctuary — Sanctuary at 
Durham — how attended — Penance and atonement expected in 
Sanctuary — ^Various decrees — Sanctuary made permanent — 
Confession and oath at Beverley {Note) — Sanctuary in St. 
Martin's — rules thereof — broken — disorder — Sanctuary in 
Westminster no better — Situation and demolition of Sanctuary 
in Westminster — Decay of Sanctuary privileges in general, and 
final abolition thereof pp. 277 — 292 



CHA.PTEII XII. 

HOUBNING CUSTOMS. 



Diversity of mourning customs — Bottling tears — Strange fancies 
— Whims of dying people— Analogy between Jews and 



CONTENTS. XV 

Australians — Mourners wounding themselves — Jews pam- 
pered grief — Duration of mourning — Various customs — 
Cutting off the hair — Instances from Bible — from Greek 
tragedy — Cutting manes of horses — Keen universal — Prceficffi 
— Jews — Scripture instances — Chinese — ^the Levant negroes — 
Hindoos — Origin of Keen — Irish Keen — Mourning costume — 
Bojal mourning — Chinese — ^Black not mourning — Mourning 
etiquette in France — * Les Honneurs de la Cour* — Mourning 
in England — ^True mourning, and advantage thereof— Sonnet 
by Bishop Mant pp. 293—318 



CHAPTER XIII. 

FdinfiitAL DOLES — FUNEBAL TAPERS — ^THE FIRST FUNERAL 

AFTER THE REFORMATION. 

Funeral feasts always usual — Jews — Greeks — Romans—and 
Christians — ^Early Christian doles — ^instances— Abuse of the 
original usage of funeralrefreshment— some instances in modern 
time — ^Funeral feasting in Cumberland, and invitations thereto 
— ^Pei-petual doles— Royal obits— Royal alms— Funeral tapers 

used as emblems — ^instances— degenerated into mere shows 

Ancientorder — Chambre ardente — ^Lights at funerals — ^Waxen 

torches — ^many instances — Queen Eleanor's anniversaries 

Abbot Islip— his funeral hearse — Service in St. Paul's in 
memory of Henry II. of France— being the first funeral of 
note afber the Reformation pp. 31^ 3^2 



XVI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

EXHUMATION. 

Number of the dead — Burying treasure — Tomb of Nitocris — 
Opening treasure-tombs — ^Alaric's tomb — Spoliation of tombs 
— Tomb-rifling a trade— Desecration of tombs in France — 
Exhumation a solemn thing — Alexander's tomb robbed — St. 
Dunstan's opened — and many others — Strange circumstance in 
Danbury Church — Good Duke Humphrey — Revolting outrages 
— King Stephen — Charles L, &c. — Sepulchral robes — and spo- 
liation — Burying in ox-hide — gilded leather — ^Various modes 
of embalmment {Note) — Dismemberment of body — instances — 
Heaets — that of Bruce — Edward I. — Queen Eleanor — Mon- 
trose — Lord E. Bruce — Earls of Essex — Sir N. Crispe — Sir W. 
Temple — Shelley— Bonaparte — Heads — Sir T. More — Sir W. 
Raleigh pp. 343— 3<^$ 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE PASSING BELL. 

Summons to Divine Worship by trumpets — by wooden rattles — 
Various uses of small bells in all ages — First invention of large 
Church bells — introduction into England — used in excom- 
munication — Baptism of bells — Language of Church thereon 
— Bells removed and drowned — instances — Stanzas — Powers 
of baptized bells against evil spirits — to ward off thunder — 
Anciently priests tolled the bells — Enormous bells — Old 
rhymes — ^Mottoes on bells — Passing Bell — its original object 



CONTENTS. XVil 

and use — held to be popish — Superstitions regarding it — 
Various manner of tolling it — Various references to Passing 
Bell pp. 3^^— 387 



CHAPTER XVI. 

MINISTERING SPIRITS. 



Churchyards haunted — ^Eastern end most holy — why so esteemed 
— ^Turning to East to pray — holy men did so — ^reasons 
why — Spirits all round us — Constant ministry of angels — ^their 
numbers — Hierarchy of angels — their titles — their active 
agency throughout creation — Guardian angels — The term 
angel — appearances of — especially attendant on our Saviour — 
constantly also on us — Bishop Bull's opinion — Grod always 
works by means of angels — proofs from Scripture — ^Angels 
supposed to throng the Churches — Bishop Jeremy Taylor on 
this — St. Chrysostom — Ter Sanctus — Women covered in 
Church on account of the angels — Angels present at the death 
of the just pp. 388— 406 



GOD'S ACRE. 



CHAPTER I. 

ANCIENT BURIAL. 

Man's home is in the grave ! 
Here dwell the multitude. 

From tomb to tomb one lesson still replies. 

IT^HERE is nothing so momentous as death, as 
-^ there is nothing so imminent, nothing so certain, 
nothing so universal ^ It is appointed unto all men 
once to die/ There is no exemption, no reprieve. 
This * happeneth unto all / to the king on the 
loftiest throne— to the wretch in the most miserable 
hovel; to Dives in his purple luxury — to Lazarus 
in his squaUd rags ; to the murderer in his chains — 
or the meek Christian in her holy ministerings ; — 
for ' dust to dust' was the sentence pronounced on all 
humanity. 

All nations, and languages, and people : the 
ancient princes of the earth, when that glorious 
earth was fresh from the hand of her Maker, and 
the morning stars sang together for joy; those 
Titans of the new-created world, almost &bulous to 

B 



2 god's ACBE. 

US in their superhuman might ; the awful patriarchs 
of the antediluvian age ; the hoary elders of the 
chosen people of God ; the mighty nations whose 
records are lost in the mists of ages rolled away ; the 
polished people who gave laws to the known world ; 
the hordes of barbarians to whom they, in their turn, 
succumbed; the Numidian and the Scythian; the 
bond and the free ; the swarthy Ethiop and the pale 
Frank ; the red Indian, the tawny Chinese, and the 
fair-haired harbingers of ' progress' through new- 
discovered worlds; — every soul of every climate, 
nation, and language under heaven — from him who 
breathed in Paradise to ^ the babe that did bttt yes- 
terday suspire' — ^hath yielded, must yield, to the fiat, 
^Dost thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.' 

AKI) DXATH HATH PASSED UPON ALL. 

This being so, all circumstances connected with a 
theme so engrossing and momentous must needs be 
imbued with an interest passing that which pertains 
to more transitory concerns. Each human being has 
a personal stake in that crisis which must, in some 
short period, come home to himself. 

The care and tendance usually bestowed on this 
mortal part^ when laid to rest and to wait ^ in hope,' 
is a subject which more or less occupies the attention 
of all thoughtful pepple. 



ANCIENT BUBIAL. 3 

After reading of the barbarous usages of savage 
nations, or of the elaborate rites of cultivated ones ; 
of the vagaries of fanaticism, or the strange fancies 
into which poor untaught human nature has been 
beguiled — ^we turn with thankful reverence to the 
serene, simple, and hopeful observances which Chris- 
tianity teaches, when ^ man goeth to his long home, 
and the mourners go about the streets/ 

Volume upon volume would hardly suffice to 
exemplify fully such usages ; but these few notices — 
cuUed in no irreverent spirit, and with no careless 
hand, from memorials which have met my view-^ 
may, I venture to hope, be found acc^table and 
interesting. 

Brief indeed must be our general leferences ;— and 
here, even on the very threshold of inquiry, we are 
stopped ; for when that ' reaper whose name is 
Death' gathered the first-fruits of his human harvest, 
we have no record, no trace, no intimation of the 
proceedings of the then wretched first couple in 
regard to the remains of their murdered son. Pro- 
bably, he was laid in the earth ; for there is a tradi- 
timiy rife to this day, that his bereaved parent, Adam, 
was * buried on Mount Calvary' (on the very place — », 
that the tradition may lose no point — on which the 
Bedeemer's cross was afterwards elevated) : and we 

B 2 



4 god's acbe. 

are told by a recent txaveller, that Golgotha, 'the 
place of a skull/ was so npmed because Adam's wba 
found there — ^he having desired to be buried where 
he knew, prophetically, the blood of the Saviour 
should in due time be shed. 

Such a tradition as this is indeed more curious 
than important — more interesting than trustworthy ; 
but it refers to a requisition of humanity which 
never was, never can be, regarded with indifference. 

'Give me possession of a burying-place, that I 
may bury my dead out of my sight,' said the great 
patriarch to the sons of Heth: a stem necessity — a 
peremptory duty throughout the whole earth, from 
the death of the first man to the babe of to-day — 
from the beginning of time even until its end ; one, 
too, which touches all the higher and nobler sym- 
pathies of our nature— one regarded by the wisest 
with pious reverence, and by the most ignorant with 
superstitious awe, and which by all is marked with 
ceremonial observances, as varied almost as the 
diverse nations who people the globe. 

The Egyptians, the wisest nation on earth, as also 
the fountain of wisdom to others, exhausted all their 
skill and science in a futile attempt to preserve the 
perishable body— futile, for though, as recent experi- 
ment has proved, 



ANCTENT BURIAL. 5 

The wheat three thousand years interred 
Will still its harvest hear, 

it is not so with man's mortal frame. The revolting 
and discoloured heap, which is the most successful 
result of all their vain exertion, crumbles to dust 
instantly on exposure to the air. 

This custom of embalming originated, perhaps, in 
the opinion which we are told they held, that so 
long as a body remained uncorrupted, so long the 
soul continued with it ; and this idea accounts also 
for their frequent custom — so terrible to us — of 
keeping the dead in their own habitation. Certainly 
it was their opinion that, after many thousand years, 
the soul reinhabits the body if it be preserved 

entire. 

The Greeks, the most polished and cultivated of 
nations, very often, though not universally, burnt 
their dead, and interred the ashes in urns of more or 
less expense, surrounded with trophies more or less 
costly, mingled with coin and jewels more or less 
valuable, as circumstances might warrant ; and the 
cinerary urns of the Romans, their imitators, are 
become almost common to our sight; though the 
earlier practice of this people was probably to bury, 
not Y^jpiiL It is said that the latter mode was 
adopted when it was found that, in protracted wars^ 
the dead remained disinterred. In the fourth 



6 GOiy'S ACBE. 

century after Christ, cremation was entirely super- 
seded by buriaL 

The richly and elaborately adorned sepulchral 
chambers of Etruria, wherein the domestic house- 
hold was imitated, and all the usual circumstances 
of life portrayed, and the highly-decorated mummy- 
tombs of Egypt, all attest the same anxiety, reve- 
rence, and most earnest care for the dead in nations 
of the highest learning and cultivation, which strike 
us even through the strange and barbarous rites and 
customs of savage hordes. 

Strange indeed, and most barbarous, are many, 
of these. We can only briefly refer to some few of 
them. 

Some gipsy tribes bury their dead on the tops of 
high mountains; others lay them in water. The 
Parsees expose their dead to be devoured by birds 
and beasts of prey, from a superstitious fear, taught 
in their religion, of polluting water, earth, or fire ; 
as do also the inhabitants of the kingdom of Tibet, 
where sacred dogs are kept in great numbers for a 
purpose elsewhere viewed with horror — i.e., to 
devour the relics of humanity. 

In Scythia they formerly kept dead bodies aflSxed 
to trees, enveloped in snow and ice ; and the savage 
people of New Holland still hang them in baskets 
from treea The Orinocos suspend them in a run- 



ANCISNT BtJBUL. 7 

ning stream till the fishes have cleared the flesh' 
from, the bones, which are then interred; and the 
natives of the Lower Murray convert the skulls of 
their deceased relatives into drinking vessels. 

Among the nations upon the Congo river, a corpse 
is enveloped in numberless wrappings of cloth, or 
perhaps of European cotton, the number of which is 
only limited by the power of the mourner to obtain, 
them — the bulk only restrained with reference to 
the conveyance to the grave. Accumulating by de- 
grees, this wrapping goes on for years. The larger, 
the bulk, the handsomer is considered the AineraL 

Man is truly ' a noble anima^ splendid in ashes, 
and pompous in the grave.' ^ Very revolting have 
been the customs of many heathen people.^ The 



^ From the very day of the writer of the JSydHotaphia, every 
scribbler has quoted this apothegm. 

^ 'The Sindians buried with each of their dead warriors as 
many fishes as he had slain enemies. 

' The Bactrians gave their dead to dogs kept for the purpose. 

' The Caktians eat them themselves. 

' The Pontines dried the heads of their relations. 

' The Colchians wrapped their bodies in fresh hides, and hung 
tiiem upon willows. 

' The Lyoians put on women's clothes for mourning. 

' In the Balearic Isles they chopped up their dead and potted 
them. 

* The Coans pulverized their tishes in a mortar, imd scattered 
themwthe sea.' 



8^ god's acbk 

Tapuyas and some Moxa tribes grind the bones of 
the dead, and mix them with the food they take. 
* To bum the bones of the King of Edom (Amos ii. • 
V. i) for lyme seems no irrational ferity ; but to drink 
the ashes of dead relations a passionate prodigality/ 
says Sir Thomas Browne, referring to Artemisia, 
Queen 6f Halicamassus, who is said to have had the 
ashes of her husband Mausolus mingled with her 
beverage. 

The people near the Ganges lay their dead or 
dying relatives along the banks at high-water mark, 
for the tide to carry them away, having first filled 
their mouths with the sacred mud. This river is 
cionsidered very holy, and numbers of dead bodies 
are daily seen floating in the stream. Indeed, pious 
Hindoos implore to be carried there in their dying 
agonies, believing that their sins are washed away by 
the sacred waters. 

Throughout parts of Hindostan, when all hopes of 
recovery are over, the dying person is laid on the 
earth, that he may expire on the element from 
which he was originaUy formed. The male relatives 
attend the corpse to the funeral-pile, and the ashes 
are sprinkled with milk and consecrated water, 
brought from the Ganges or some other holy stream. 

The Caflres alone seem to have been inhuman 
enough utterly to forsake their dead — ^worse even 



ANCIENt BtmiAL. 9 

Aan this, from some fearful superstition they cast 
their sick relatives, yet living and breathing, to be 
devoured by beasts of prey. 

All these various customs, how revolting soever to* 
us, do still testify to earnest anxiety about the dead 
on the part of the deceased's relatives. Universally 
almost, even amongst savage hordes, deep reverence 
is attached to places of burial.. In the Tonga islands 
the deadliest enemies chancing to meet there 
mutually refrain from hostility. The burial-places 
of people of note in New Zealand are universally 
tapu, or sacred. 

To the Christian for a brief moment turn we. 
He, with decent solemnity, lays the body in its 
native earth, so that the dust may be resolved to 
dust as soon as may be, consistently with the revealed 
doctrine of the resurrection of the body. For the 
first object,, the mere accomplishment of the original 
curse of dust toc dust, is more speedily and easily 
attained by the cremation which was usual among 
the classical nations, and not unknown to the 
Jews.^ 

^ One of the last instances of cremation in any Christian 
ooimtry is that of Henry Lattrens, the first President of the 
American Congress. He desired in his will that his hody might 
be bomt, and required this from his children as a duty. An 
infimt daughter had been laid out as dead, and revived by fresh 



10 god's acbe. 

Bufc sepulture appears to be the most ancient^ as 
well, as the most holy, method of disposing of this 
outward tabernacle^ ' as soon as its uses here are at 
an end.' 

Amongst the Jews sepulchres appear to haye been 
chiefly caves hollowed out, or those natural ones 
which abound in the rocks of Palestina^ These were 



air from the window, which had been closed daring her illness.. 
He had also peculiar notions of tiie purifying natore of fire. 

0*Meara, in his account of Napoleon in exile, writes that tho , 
Emperor, when speaking of funeral rites, said ' he would wish 
that his body might be burned. It is the best mode,' added he, 
' as then the corpse does not produce any inconvenience : and as 
to the resurrection, that would be accomplished by a miracle ; 
and it is as easy to the Being who has it in his power to accom- 
plish such a miracle as bringing the remains of the bodies 
together, to form also again the ashes of the dead.' 

The remains of the poet Shelley were burnt on the sea-shore, 
a quantity of salt and frankincense being used, which gave a 
very peculiar colouring to the flame. 

^ At Butchester, one of the stations upon the Roman Wall 
in Northumberland, is a sepulchre hewn out of the living rock, 
wherein Leland says Paulinus (who converted the Northum- 
brians to Christianity) was interred. But there are similar 
ones, evidently sepulchres, in various parts of England. At 
Chester there is, or was, one to which tradition attaches the 
name of Harold, our last Saxon king. There is in the Britifih 
Museum Library an old manuscript, detailing the legend of 
Harold's recovray from the wounds under which he fell in the. 



ANCIENT BtTRIAL, II 

kept whitewashed, at least such as were appropriated 
to public burial Family ones were often contiguous 
to the residence : Abraham's at the end of his field ; 
that belonging to Joseph of Arimathea, where oiir 
Saviour was laid, wais in his garden. The tombs of 
the Kings of Judah were in Jerusalem, and in the' 
royal gardens; those of the Eongs of Israel in 
Samaria.^ AU were regarded with great reverence; 
for that a man should not come to the tomb of his 
fathers is a denunciation of Holy Writ 

* He shall be buried with the burial of an ass,' was 
the curse of greatest horror uttered against the 
chosen people of Grod ; and that this horror is inhe- 
rent in our human nature, is evident firom the pre- 
valence of it in all ages and climes. One of the most 
celebrated writers of antiquity has bequeathed us a 
fine illustration of this feeling in his beautiful tragedy 
of Antig<me, when Polynioes k refused the rites of 



Battle of Hastmgs, his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, his passing 
the close of his years as a hermit^at Chester, and his final repose 
in that tomb in the rock which he had excavated with his own 
hands. 

^ Bachel was buried on the highway from Jerusalem to 
Bethlehem. 

Samuel and Joah were interred, in their own houses. 

Aaron, Eleazar, and Joshua in mountains. 

Dehorah under a tree. 

Manasseh and Amon in the garden of Uzzah. 



I^ GOD'S AOBK 

^pulture, and his sister, at the risk of a fearful 
4oom — which, indeed, she undergoes — ^reverentljr 
buries his corpse. Indeed, it was considered the 
height of impiety to leave even a stranger-corpse 
unburied, though met only by chance. This general 
obligation of one of the first oi moral laws was 
heightened in Antigone by every feeling of relation- 
Qhip, affection, pity; horror, and dismay. 

There was a law of Athens compelling the burial 
of a dead body found by aoddent, and pronouncing 
the refuser impious.^ 

It was reckoned ^ infamous '' to disturb a grave : 
the punishment of death was awarded to slaves and 
the lower classes for disturbing a corpse ; persons of 
rank incurred the forfeiture of half thdb: property 
thereby. 

^ When I ii^ter a dead body,^ says Seneca, ^ though 
I never saw or knew the party wh^i he was alive, I 
deserve nothing for my so dcnng, since I do but 
discharge an obligation which I owe to human 
nature.' 

In an epistle written by the Boman clergy, during 
the exile of St Cyprian, referring to various duties 



^ Among the Mohammedans, the carrying of a dead body is 
supposed to expiate a deadly sin; therefore all who meet a 
funeral procession on the way to the burial-place generally 
assist in it. 



«♦., ^ 



ANCIENT BUBIAL. 13 

requisite towaids the sick, prisoners, and others, it is 
added, ' And eapedaZly if the bodies of martyrs and 
others a/re not buriedy great peril hangs over those 
whose duty this is. By whomsoever, then, and on 
whatsoever occasion, this duty shall be performed, 
we are sure that he will be accounted a good 
servant/ 

When the King of France, Louis IX., approached 
Sidon, he found the dead bodies of the Christians who 
had been lately massacred by the Turcomans remain* 
ing stm exposed in heaps. The monaxch instantly 
stopped, and desired the legate to consecrate a place 
for burial ; he then commanded that the bodies should 
•be interred. Instead of obeying, all turned aside 
in horror from the decomposing carcasea The king 
dismounted, and raising with his own hands one of 
the bodies, ^Aliens, mes amis,' he cried, ^allons 
donner un pen de terre aux martyrs de Jesus Christ." , 
His noble example was immediately followed. 

In Holy Writ we read — 

' Wheresoever thou findest the dead, take them and 
bury them, and I will give thee the first place in my 
reaurrection,' 

In the beautiful history of Tobit we are told not 
merely of his giving * many alms to his brethren,' his 
* bread to the hungry,' and his ' clothes to the naked ;' 
but, says he — 



14 OOD^S ACRE. 

' If I saw any of my nation dead, or cast about the 
walls of Nineve, / bv/ried hirrp. 

* And if the King Sennacherib had slain any, when 
he was come, and fled from Judaea, / buried t?iem 
privily; for in his wrath he killed many ; but the 
bodies were mot found when they were sought for 
of the king. 

' And when one of the Ninevites went and com- 
plained of me to the king, that I buried them and 
hid myself; understanding that I was to be sought 
for, to be put to death, I withdrew myself for 
fear. 

'Then all my goods were forcibly taken away, 
neither was there anything left me besides my wife 
Aniia and my son Tobias.' 

In the recent excavations at Kineveh the tomb of 

this good man is supposed to have been discovered. 

^ I will proceed with this narrative, so apposite to my 

subject, in the simple and touching phrase in which 

it has come down to us. 

After the death of Sennacherib, Tobit returned to 
Nineveh, and he continues — 

' In the feast of Pentecost, which is the holy feast 
of the seven weeks, there was a good dinner prepared 
me, in the which I sat down to eat 

' And when I saw abundance of meat, I said to my 
son. Go, and bring what poor man soever thou shalt 



ANdEKT BURIAL. 15 

find out of our brethi<en, who is mindful of the Lord ; 
and, lo, I tarry for thefe. 

* But he csune again, and sdid, Father, one of our 
nation is strangled, and is cast out in the market- 
place. 

'llien before I had tasted of any meat, I started 
up, and took him up into a room until the going 
down of the sun. 

^ Then I returned, and washed myself, and ate my 
meat in heayiness. 

^Bememberingthat prophecy of Amos, asiie said^ 
' Your fea^ shall be turned into mourning, and all 
your mii-th into lamentation.' 

'Therefore I wept; and after the going down of 
the sun, I weiit a^d made a grave, and buried him. 

'But my neighbours mocked me, and said. This 
laan is not yet afraid to be put to death for this 
matter : who fled away ; and yet, lo, he burieth the 
. dead again. 

* The same night also I returned from the burial, 
-and slept by the wall of my courtyard, being polluted.' 

For I need not tell you that the Jews were con- 
nd^ed polluted if they touched a corpse, and that 
particular purifications were specified in the Mosaic 
ritual to be resorted to on such occasions. 

Amongst the Greeks during the exhibition, the 
"^ lying in state' as we should now call it, of a dead 



i6 god's acbe. 

body, in the yestibule of a house, a vesael of lustra! 
water was always in readiness to purify those ^rlxo 
might touch the corpse. It was profanation to a 
priest even to look on one. 

Indeed, some people would not even pass under 
a corpse, as is shown in the instance of Queen 
Nitocris, whose tomb was erected over the principal 
gate in Babylon. This outlet became, thenceforward, 
deserted. 

The ceremonial of the Jews above referred to may 
probably have been the origin of the superstition 
prevalent in many places to this day, that it is 
* imlucky' to touch a corpse. 

* I saw,' says a very recent traveller in Sweden, 'a 
woman run over by a cart She lay at the side of a 

. street, and no one would raise her up ; for she seemed 
to be dead, and they do not think it lucky to be the 
first to touch the body in such a casa But when I 
lifted her up the bystanders said directly, *Come, 
let us help ;' and then I had many assistants.' 

A few last words of Tobit. When his son is re- 
stored to him, his daughter-in-law healed, his own 
blindness cured, the angel Baphael says to him : — 

* When thou didst pray, I did bring the remem- 
brance of your prayers before the Holy One; and 
when thou didst bury the dead, I was with thee like- 
wise. 



1 



AKCIENT BUBIAL. 



17 



' And when thou didst not delay to rise up and 
leave thy dinner, to go and cover the dead, thy 
good deed was not hid from me : but I was with 
thee. 

* And now God hath sent me to heal thee/ 

* Blessed be ye of the Lord,' said David to the men 
of Jabesh Gilead, ' that ye have showed this kindness 
unto your lord, even unto Saul, and have buried 
him.' 



The most fearful part of an interdict by the Pope 
in Eroman Catholic countries has always been felt 
to be the not allowing the rites of sepulture, and the 
burying the dead in unconsecrated ground.^ 

^ Tet even the last distressing resource is surely better than 
the repelling alternative resorted to by the Knights Templars 
with regard to one of their order, Geofirey Magnaville, who 
died under sentence of excommunication in the reign of Stephen. 
His brethren, not daring to bury, enclosed the corpse in a leaden 
case or pipe (canaliculo), and hung it on a tree. Though thus 
under the ban of the Pope, he is said to have been a founder and 
endower of monasteries ; perhaps, indeed, as was not unusual 
then, to propitiate Heaven towards the close of a wicked life. 
After some time his absolution was obtained from Pope Alex- 
ander III., and his body was taken down from the tree and 
buried in the round, or most ancient part of the New Temple 
Church, which now serves as a porch to the main building. 

When an interdict occurred in France in the reign of Philip 

C 



1 8 qod's agbe. 

Wordsworth, in the following lines, gi^es a graphic 
picture of this horrible infliction : — 

The Churoh .... 

Closes the gates of every sacred place. 

Straight from the sun and tainted air's emhraoe 

All things are covered : cheerful mom 

Grows sad as night — ^no seemly garb is worn, 

Nor is a face allowed to meet a huso 

With natural smiles of greeting. Bella are dumb ; 

Ditches are graves— funereal rites denied ; 

And in the churchyard he must take his bride 

Who dares be wedded ! 

One cannot be surprised that a circumstance of 
such individual as well as universal concernment as 
burial of the dead, should be fraught with deepest 
interest to all who have minds to reason, and with 
superstitious awe and wild fancies to the ignorant and 
untaught 

The Christian puts sweet springing flowers into 
the tomb as a fitting emblem both of death and 
of resurrection^ and evergreens as a type of eternal 
Kfe. 

The untaught Indian endeavours to provide for 
the necessities of a future world, and places bow and 
arrows in the grave of the departed, lest he should 



Augustus, numbers of devout persons left their country, and 
passed into Normandy and Brittany, where, as fiefs of England, 
the ceremoniea of the Churoh were not interrupted. 



AN0IENT BUBIAL. I9 

be deprived of his usual resources in the hunting- 
fields beyond the sky : — 

They buried the dark chief; they freed 
Beside the grave his battle steed ; 
And swift an arrow cleaved its way 
To his stem heart ! One piercing neigh 
Arose — and on the dead man's plain 
The rider grasps his steed again. 

In many countries food was placed in the tomb^ 
that its inmate might not hunger on his journey to 
another world. The learned Egyptians and the 
Greeks placed a cake made of flour and honey ; and 
the master of 

The two-oared boati the Stygian barge, 

was propitiated with a fee for the transit of his 
passenger to the shades below ; a custom originating, 
no doubt, mth. the Egyptians, but which was widely 
adopted The ancient Gauls and Britons buried with 
his ashes the bonds and contracts for money that 
were made during the dead man's lifetime, that he 
might show them in the other world, and exact the 
money from his debtors which was due to him. 

The wholesale slaughter of horses, dogs, and other 
axiimals, and even of slaves, on a funeral pyre, ori- 
ginated, probably, in some idea of the same kind — 
namely, the possible wants of the deceased in another 
lifa We are told that a great man's slaves and 



2,0 god's ACBE. 

servants were burnt with him in order that he miglit 
not go unattended to the other world; and that^ 
for the same reason, his dearest friends would rush 
voluntarily into the fire in order to accompany him. 

On the death of a king in the South Sea Islands, 
his principal friends and favourites were put to 
death; and to this 'honour^ it is said they readily 
and cheerfully submitted. This custom only ceased 
with the introduction of Christianity thera 

At and about the region of Sierra Leone, too, the 
wives and favourite women of a king were always 
put to death and buried with him. Indeed, among 
the African tribes the funerals of chiefs and great 
men are accompanied by human sacrifices to a 
horrible amount Their wives, slaves, captives, and 
horses are slain ; their arms, clothing, and treasures 
are buried with them. 

Human sacrifices in honour of the dead prevailed 
in Egypt, Assyria, Etruria, &c. In Greece and Eome 
gladiatorial combats were supposed to add dignity to 
the ceremony. 

Those customs which in older time originated in 
the mistaken idea of rtlDe necessities of the traveller 
bound to the other world,^ gradually became merely 



^ In the neighbourhood of Arica, on the west coast of South 
America, there are graves, which appear not to have been touched 



■»■ 



ANCIENT BUEIAL. 21 

a vehicle for show and ostentation; and at length 
a man^s rank and wealth were estimated by the 
number and value of the sacrificial offerings at his 
tomb. 

Of the funeral of Patroclus, Homer writes : — 

High on the top the manly corse they lay. 
And well-fed sheep and sable oxen slay : 
Achilles covered with their £a,t the dead. 
And the piled victims round the body spread; 
Then jars of honey and of fragrant oil 
Suspends around, low-bending o'er the pile. 
Four sprightly coursers with a deadly groan 
Pour forth their lives, and on the pyre are thrown. 
Of nine large dogs, domestic at his board. 
Fall two, selected to attend their lord. 
Then last of all, and horrible to tell; 
Sad sacrifice ! twelve Trojan captives fell. 
On these the rage of fire victorious preys. 
Involves and joins them in one common blaze. 

But even this wholesale slaughter was nothing to 
what we are told of in ancient writers, as part of the 
ceremonial of a Scythian king's funeral. 

The mourners disfigured themselves, cut ofif a 
piece of their ears, shaved their heads, gashed their 
arms and faces, &c. It was some such type of 



since the Conquest of Peru, lying along the coast on the site of 
an ancient fishing village. In each grave was found invariably a 
fishing-hook, and underneath^ a quantity of shell-fish, probably 
as bait for the hook. — ^Psttigbew. 



27, god's acre. 

mourning I suppose, borrowed probably from heathen 
nations, which Moses condemns in the children of 
Israel.^ 

The remains of the royal Scythian were graced at 
the moment of interment by the sacrifice of one of 
his wives, his cupbeaxer, his cook, his groom, his 
valet, and his messenger, who were all strangled and 
interred with him ; and a few months afberwcurds 
fifty native Scythian slaves and fifty fine horses were 
strangled, and placed as trophies, or ornaments, round 
the barrow. 

Yet is even this merciful as compared with what 
we are told of a custom of Guiana, that when a Carib 
chief dies, his wives are expected, for thirty days, in 
that climate, to watch the body so closely that not 
even a fly may alight on it At the end of this 
probation one would think that death would be a 
boon to all. One only is sacrificed at the funeral. 
The immolation of a Hindoo widow is merciful as 
compared with this. 

But the pjrramidal catacombs of Egypt, the ela- 
borated Etruscan chambers, the chiselled wonders of 
Petra, and other Eastern excavated sepulchres, and 



^ See vnfray chap. xii. Also, we may remark, that Mohammed 
was very peremptory and earnest in his decrees against snch 



cnstoms. 



ANCIENT BUBIAL. 2$ 

the newly-explored marvels of Nineveh, are all re- 
sults of intelligence, progress, and refinement ; it is 
to the rude cairn, the sepulchral heap, that we must 
refer as the usual mode of interment in uncultivated 
times. 

Barrows, or immense mounds of earth, are sup- 
posed to be the most ancient aud the most general 
sepulchral monuments in the world. They are found 
in almost every part of the habitable globe, having 
been preserved, doubtless, in many instances, by the 
custom, almost universal, of each passer-by throwing 
a stone on the mass. There are a great many bar- 
rows in England in which were bones of animals 
mingled with those of human kind ; but, indeed, the 
contents of these tumuli are as varied as are the 
habits of the diflferent people who occupy the world. 

Dr. Clarke, speaking of the barrows in Russia^ 
says :—' Throughout the whole of this country are 
seen, dispersed over immense plains, mounds of earth 
covered with a fine turf, the sepulchres of the ancient 
world, common to almost every habitable country. 
If there exist anything of former times which may 
afford monuments of antediluvian manners, it is this 
mode of burial.' 

In the New World barrows are the inseparable 
appendices to great settlements. They are of various 
forms, proportions^ and sizes. They are called Indian 



24 GODS ACRE. 

graves ; and one in Virginia was opened which con- 
tained the bones of nearly one hundred persona 

This mode pf burial was gradually discontinued in 
every country as civilization increased and refinement 
advanced. The barrows raised over the remains 
of Fatroclus, Hector, Achilles, and other Homeric 
heroes of wide-world renown, have been described 
and quoted by writers innumerable. But in later 
days, while the tomb of the accomplished Greek was 
adorned with all the pride of exquisite sculpture, and 
celebrated with all the pathos of el^iac strain, and 
whilst the magnificent Roman was raising cenotaphs 
over the remains of friends inumed with aU the 
pomp and circumstance of woe, the Briton continued 
the rude usages of the Celts and the Belgse. Many 
of the large isolated barrows in waste lands, opened 
in our own country, contain urns and burnt bones; 
others, bones in their natural, state, the body having 
been buried without burning. The former are guessed 
to be Belgic Gauls ; the latter the Celtic Britons, a 
more primitive people, who adopted the most early 
rites of burial. 

Not wanting in solemn pomp, in gorgeous cere- 
monijEd, in mystic and awful incantation, but yet 
reeking with human sacrifice and unhallowed rite, 
was the reUgion of our ancestors in Britain, before 



ANCIENT BURIAL. 25 

the * tidings of great joy' had reached our shores — 
ere the ' beautiful feet ' of the Messenger had 
alighted on the blood-stained mountains. 

The learning and wisdom of the Druids have been 
largely descanted on ; and there was certainly much 
to lay hold of the imagination in a cultivated mind, 
much to impress with awe and terror an ignorant 
one, in their religious solemnities. The deep, vast, 
and solemn groves in which these mysteries were 
celebrated ; the circle of huge altar-stones, near each 
of which stood the attendant priest, ready to ignite 
the blue flame which at one and the same instant 
gleamed on all ; the Arch-Druid, majestic in his gait, 
venerable in his appearance^ waving the asphodel 
aloft near the mystical rocking-stone, or stabbing to 
the heart the noble milk-white bull, as a propitiatory 
sacrifice to an ^ unknown god;' whilst circling around 
were priestly bands, sweeping their solemn harps 

Amid the hush of ages which are dead ; 

evoking triumphant strains which rang out gloriously 
to the skies, or chanting mournful dirges which stole 
tremulously along the forest glades, mingling with 
the pure and gentle breath of evening in ' a dying, 
dying fall ' — all this is certainly beautiful as a jpic- 
ture ; but it is only an attractive portal to the temple 
of a reli^on ruthless and cruel as bigotry and un- 



26 god's acrel 

tamed nature could devise.^ Not amongst these 
beguiling accessories were maxims of peace, of cha* 
rity, of brotherly kindness taught to the living ; nor a 
future hope breathed in the stricken ear of the 
mourner; or a message of pardon and peace whispered 
to soothe the agony of the dying. 

The poor man, without future hope or death-bed 
prayer — 

Unshriven, nnanointed, unaneled — 

was buried with scant ceremony in a shroud of 
woollen fastened with a wooden pin, in a hole dug 
by the side of a hill, or on a waste plot ; while a 
little mound of soil or turf was heaped upon the spot, 
or perhaps some common stones — the commonest 
and smallest of barrow& 

When a person of more consequence died, his 



^ ' The Druids made the people pass through fire in honour of 
Beal ; and they offered up the life of man in sacrifice, saying 
that when the victim was smitten with a sword, they could dis- 
cover events which were to oome, by the manner in which he 
fell, and the flowing of his blood, and the quivering of his body 
in the act of death. 

' On greater occasions, a huge figure, in the rude likeness of 
man, was made of wicker-work and filled with men ; as many as 
were condemned to death for their offences were put into it; 
but if these did not suffice to fill the image, the innocent were 
thrust in, and they surrounded it with straw and wood, and set 
fire to it, and consumed it, with all whom it contained.' 



._j 



ANCIENT BURIAL. %*J 

horse and favourite domestic animals, and perhaps, 
too, his servants, were burnt round his funeral pyre. 
The remains were buried in a stone chest or kistvean 
(many of which have been found in Britain), which 
was composed of five large flat stones, the fifth form- 
ing the lid. Sometimes this was placed upon a hill 
or barrow ; very frequently a hill or barrow was built 
over it, made of earth, with large stones set round 
about 

Kings and nobles were distinguished by a barrow 
of greater height and larger dimensions, often sur- 
mounted by a monument of one enormous flat stone 
raised on three or four upright ones. Hubba, the 
Dane, was buried under a very large barrow in 
Devonshire. We are told of another Dane who 
employed his whole army, and a number of oxen, 
to place an immense stone on the tumulus of his 
mother. 

There are large numbers of barrows scattered over 
England, and especially clustered in Wiltshire. A 
great many have been opened ; some containing un- 
bumt skeletons, others such as have evidently under- 
gone the action of fire. Besides human remains, 
there have been found animals of all sorts, from the 
skeleton of a horse to that of a fowl ; all imaginable 
warlike instruments, domestic utensils, or ornamental 
trifles, from a battle-spear or a pole-axe to a bit of 



28 god's acbr 

amber or a row of glass beads — from an iron torques 
or a silver or gold bracelet to an ivory hook or a 
crystal ball. 

The traveller to the Lakes, passing over Dnnmail 
Rise, the desolate frontier of Cumberland and West- 
moreland, is reminded (or used to be, before the era 
of railroads) of the death-place and burial-cairn of the 
last king of Cumberland. For here, more than a 
thousand years ago. Dun Mail, ' with all his peerage, 
fell \ and here was a huge barrow raised over their 
remains. 

But happy are we to turn from these slight though 
most painful memorials of heathenism, to that long- 
predicted period when the Bay-Star from on high 
beamed over the earth, and the mild rays of Christian 
hope penetrated the darkness and gloom which had 
theretofore shrouded the borders of the grave. 



„J 



CHAPTER II. 

CHRISTIAN BUBIAL. 

They have not perished — ^no ! 
Kind words, remembered voices once so sweet. 

Smiles radiant long ago, 
And features, the great soul's apparent seat— 

All shall come back : each tie 
Of pure affection shall be knit again ; 

Alone shall evil die. 

A S the natural impulse of humanity is to look, not 
-^ merely with mournful awe, but with dread and 
horror, to death and the grave, it is not easy for us 
who have the privilege to be born under Christianity, 
to estimate the feelings of those by whom its reve- 
lations were unexpected and undreamt of. The 
sudden noise of gushing waters to the parched and 
fainting wanderer in Afncan deserts could hardly 
come Lh a more reviving sound physic^y, tJ 
did, mentally and spiritually, the tidings of redemp- 
tion and release, and new and eternal life, to the 
worn and weary slaves of paganism. The sudden 
blaze of a comet on the dazzled eye of the scientific 
inquirer who had been for months and years in 
doubting search after it, is but a poor type for the 
delight of the earnest, thoughtful, philosophical 



30 QOD*S AGBE. 

heathen, at those glad tidings of great joy pro- 
mulged by our blessed Saviour's life and death. 

For no sacrificial offerings, no slaughter of dumb 
unoffending animals, of faithful servants, of, it may 
be, a true-hearted affectionate wife, do we find in the 
sepulchral customs of those who strove, however 
humbly, to follow in the steps and to illustrate the 
precepts of our Redeemer. Still less was there of 
gloom, or woe, or melancholy, or lamentation in those 
rites of the early Christians which testified their 
belief that their lowly-minded brother was passing 
from this mortal pilgrima^ to the true and ever- 
lasting life. 

There was no need to place material food for one 
going where hunger and thirst were unknown; 
neither was there any cause for weeping and wailing 
for him who merely ^ exchanged' this life for a better 
— who * exchanged' earth for heaven, mortal life for 
immortality; who had entered that land where sin 
and sorrow never come, and where tears are wiped 
from every eye. 

Not like a pagaa's was his bier 

At doleful midnight borne. 
By ghastly torchlight, and with wail 

Of women hired to mourn. 

The Greeks and Bomans, but especially the 
former, were accustomed to bury in the night— in- 



CHRISTIAN BURIAL. 3 1 

deed, were forbidden by law to celebrate their burial 
rites in the daytime; and their funeral procession 
was usually accompanied by hired mourners, women, 
whose part it was to shriek and wail, to call upon 
the deceased in loud and often discordant tones, as 
if bemoaning the end — ^the miserable end^-of all 
things. 

But by Redemption, Death, so alien to our natural 
feelings, so awful and repugnant to our innate weak- 
ness, is converted into an angel of mercy. 

More practically so looked at, perhaps, than usually 
we deem, amongst the poor and afflicted. We have 
Scripture warrant for this :— 

' O death, acceptable is thy sentence unto the 
needy, and unto him whose strength faileth, that is 
now in the last age, and is vexed with all things, and 
to him that despaireth and hath lost patience.'*— 
Ecdus. xli. 7,, 

The much-suffering look on Death not as the 
destroying angel on the pale horse, not as the ghastly 
spectre whose unerring dart bears on its point the 
annihilation of all their joys and pleasures, but as the 
friend who is to give them release and repose, as the 
guide who is to lead them home. Home ! — ^that is 
the expression the poor, the weary, the desolate, and 
the exhausted use. They are going home. What 
other word in this or any other vocabulary pos- 



32 god's acbe. 

Besses the same force ? The very essence of peace^ 
security, comfort, is implied in that one word — 
Home. 

Shortly before I made these notes, a poor woman^ 
very sick, having been for a long time a sufferer 
under a distressing and exhausting complaint ; laden 
too with other cares — for she had seven children, 
who, born to penury, often implored for the bread 
which she had not to bestow; she having only a 
squalid, meagre lodging, and all its concomitant 
discomforts ; spending busy, anxious days ; and nightcf, 
not only sleepless, but agonized, from her cruel 
disease; — this poor woman came to me for some 
little assistance in clothing. She was hardly able to 
speak from the oppression on her lungs, but contrived 
to gasp out her story, of which I previously knew 
the truth from him, now gone before, who had re- 
ferred her to me. 

' You are very ill,' I said. 

' It's my dear breath. Ma'am.' 

She seemed to have little anxiety as to the result 
of the doctors' consultation, for which she was prcr 
paring, for she concluded her story with the remark- 
able words — 

^But, Ma'am, I think that I'm going home fast 
Thank God, I feel Fm going home /' ^ 

Her prognostication was verified. Very shortly 



CHRISTIAN BURIAL. ^ 

afterwards she was called to that home ^ where the 
weary are at rest/ 

It is on the death-bed that the rich and poor are 
equalized : the pauper whose whole life on earth has 
been one of toil and privation, if not also of sickness 
and sorrow — ^who, patient and unrepining, has borne 
toil and contumely, misery and scorn — can indeed 
look forward to death only as a signal of relief from 
a life of hopelessness; but it is 'difficult, it is very 
difficult, for him who has luxuriated in enjoyment 
here, to reaUze to himself the fact that all these 
things — ^not merely the pomp and circumstance, but 
the higher enjoyments which riches may purchase 
and cultivated intellect acquire — that all these things 
are mere nothingness. It requires a heart more 
purified from earthly stain than is easily attainable 
by those who luxuriate in the good things of this life, 
to lie down on the bed of death with the simple 
trust of one going home. Hence did our Saviour 
say that it is easier for a camel to pass through a 
needle's eye than for a rich man to enter into the 
kingdom of Heaven. Hence are the rich and poor 
made equal. 

Under all circumstances death must be incitive 
of awe to survivors, and in all cases where affection 
has existed, of grief. We are not forbidden to mourn : 
our Saviour wept for Lazarus i but the early Chris- 

D 



34 god's ague. 

tians straggled to repress their natural sorrow, by 
dwelling more especially on the new joy of the 
Christian's hope. 

On this point I will quote one of our earliest 
authorities, St. Augustin, Bishop of Hippo. In my 
preface I announced this book to be, in Miss Hit- 
ford's phrase, 'miscellaneous and wayward;' it is 
essentially ' a skip-and-go-on' book ; but I think few 
who begin to read the following passages, taken 
from the narrative by that Christian gentleman and 
early father of the Church of the death of his 
mother, will ' skip' one of them. 

Monica died in her fifty-sixth year, in the thirty- 
third of Augustin, her son. 

' Lay,' she said, ' this body anywhere ; let not the 
care for that any way disquiet you: this only I 
request, that you would remember me at the Lord's 
altar, wherever you be.' 

Her son writes thus :— 

'I closed her eyes; and there overflowed withal 
a mighty sorrow into my heart, which was over- 
flowing into tears ; mine eyes at the same time, by 
the violent command of my mind, drank up their 
fountain wholly dry; and woe was me in such a 
strife. But wh^i she breathed her last, the boy 
Adeodatus burst out into a loud lament ; then, 
checked by us all, held his peace. In like manner 



CHBISTIAN BX7BIAL. 35 

also a childish feeling in me, which was, through my 
heart's youthful voice, finding its vent in weeping, 
was checked and silenced. For we thought it not 
fitting to solemnize that funeral with tearful lament 
and groanings ; for thereby do they for the most part 
express grief for the departed, aa though unhappy, 
or altogether dead; whereas she was neither un- 
happy i/n her deaiky nor altogether dead. Of this 
vje were assured on good grrotiTicfo— the testimony 
of her good conversation and her faith unfeigned. 

' The boy then being stilled from weeping, Euodius 
took up the Psalter, and began to sing, our whole 
house answering him, the Psalm, / wiU emg of 
Toercy amd judgment to Thee, Lord. But 
hearing what we were doing, many brethren and 
religious women came together; and whilst they 
(whose office it was) made ready for the bunal, as the 
manner is, I (in a part of the house where I might 
properly), together with those who thought not fit 
to leave me, discoursed upon something fitting the 
time ; and by this balm of truth, assuaged that tor- 
ment, known to Thee, they unknowing and listening 
intently, and conceiving me to be without all sense 
of sorrow. But in Thy ears, where none of them 
heard, I blamed the weakness of my feelings, and 
refinained my flood of grief, which gave way a little 
unto me ; but it again came, as with a tide, yet not 

D % 



3$ god's acre, 

80 as to burst out into tears, nor to a change of coun- 
teuance ; still I knew what I was keeping down in 
my heart And being much displeased that these 
human things had such power over me, which is the 
due order and appointment of our natural condition, 
must needs come to pass, with a new grief I grieved 
for my grief, and was thus worn by a double sorrow. 

* And behold the corpse was carried to the burial ; 
we went and returned without tears. For neither 
in those prayers which we poured forth unto Thee, 
when the sacrifice of our ransom was offered for her, 
when now the corpse was by the grave's side, as the 
manner there is, previous to its being laid therein, 
did I weep even during those prayers ; yet was I the 
whole day in secret heavily sad, and with troubled 
mind prayed Thee, as I could, to heal my sorrow, yet 
Thou didst not; impressing, I believe, upon my 
memory by this one instance, how strong is the bond 
of all habit, even upon a soul which now feeds upon 
no deceiving word, 

'And then by little and little I recovered my 
former thoughts of Thy handmaid, her holy conver- 
sation towards us, whereof I was suddenly deprived ; 
and I was minded to weep in Thy sight for her and 
for myself, in her behalf and in my own. And I 
gave way to the tears which I before restrained, to 
overflow as much as they desired ; reposing my heart 



CHRISTIAN BURIAL. 37 

upon them; and it found rest in them, for it was 
in Thy ears, not in those of man, who would have 
scornfully interpreted my weeping. And now, Lord, 
in writing, I confess it unto Thee, read it who will, 
and interpret it how he will, that I wept my mother 
for a small portion of an hour (the mother who for 
the time was dead to mine eyes, who had for many 
years wept for me, that I might live in Thine eyes) ; 
let him not deride me; but rather, if he be one 
of large charity, let him weep himself for my sins 
unto Thee, the Father of all the brethren of Thy 
Christ. 

' For she, the day of her dissolution now at hand, 
took no thought to have her body sumptuously wound 
up, or embalmed with spices; nor desired she a 
choice monument, or to be buried in her own land. 
These things she enjoined us not ; but desired only 
to have her name commemorated at Thy altar, which 
she had served without intermission of one day. 

'May she then rest in peace with her husband, 
before and after whom she had never any ; whom 
she obeyed with patience, hrmgvng forth fruit unto 
Thee, that she might win him also unto Thee. And 
inspire, O Lord my God, inspire Thy servants my 
brethren^ Thy sons my masters, whom with voice, 
and heart, and pen I serve, that so many as shall 
read these confessions may at Thy altar remember 



40 oob's acbe. 

a cessation of being. At the time of bis trial lie 
concluded his address to the judges thus :— 

* It is time that we should depart — I to die, you to 
live; but which for the greater good, Ood oriLy 
knows* 

What is almost the concluding sentence of Cicero's 
beautiful essay, when he has been speaking of his 
anticipations of future life in terms the highest 
possible that one * who knew not Christ' could use ? 

* These considerations, Scipio, render old age easy 
to be endured by me, and not only not irksome, but 
even pleasant, a circumstance at which both you and 
Loelius have been in the habit of expressing some 
astonishment And if I he wrong in this, that I 
believe the souls of men to be immortal, I willingly 
err, and while I live I have no wish for the error with 
which I am pleased to be wrenched from me/^ 

The merest children know by rote that when her 
family were out on pleasure. Lady Jane Grey was 
found by Eoger Ascham reading the jPAcedo of Plato, 
a work on the immortality of the souL But they 
are too little instructed that the highest point to 



^ ' His mihi rebus, Scipio, id enim te cum Loelio admirari solere 
dixisti levis est senectus, nee solum non molesta, sed etiam, 
jucunda, quod si in hoc erro, quod animos hominum immortales, 
esse credam lubenter erro : nee mihi hunc errorem quo delectoii 
dum vivo, extorqueri volo/ — De Senectute, 



/.. 



CHBISTIAN BTTRIAL. 4I 

which his sublimest philosophy could reach, and £01* 
the germ of which he was indebted to Socrates (who 
indeed is represented as an interlocutor in the dia-' 
logue), was^ that it is not to be apprehended that 
' those will be reduced to a lower state in a future life, 
who have done all in their power here to deserve a 
higher. 

Whilst this * if,' this intolerable doubt, could attach 
itself to the life-long studies, to- the most earnest 
anticipations of men of the utmost learning and 
research, who had strained to the heights of scientific 
invention, and sounded. the depths of philosophical 
investigation ; men also, as some of them were, of 
the purest morals and conduct — whilst, I say, even to 
such, an * if' could attache itself to the hereafter— 
mournful, most mournful, must have been the descent 
to the tomb, even when the fullest conviction and 
experience of the emptiness of Ufe and the weariness 
of age, deprived them, as* in the case of Cicero, of 
even the wish to prolong it^ 

Mark the difference in one, excellent indeed, but 
of no peculiar attainment, no marvellous research, 
no deeply ^studied theories; a woman only, but a 



^ 'Qaod si non sumus immortalis futuri, tamen exstingoi 
homini suo tempore optabile est. Nam habet natura, nt aliarum 
omnium rerum, sic Yivendi modum/ — De SeTiectute, 



42 god's acbe. 

Christian ; one bom in the fulness of time ; one 
privileged to know of the atonement of our Re- 
deemer. 

Thus writes the Duchess of Somerset^ wife of 
Algernon, the seventh duke, the son of him who 
bore the sobriquet of ' the proud duke.' 

* 'Tis true, my dear Lady Luxborough, times are 
changed with us since no walk was long enough, or 
exercise painful enough to hurt us, as we childishly 
imagined ; yet after a ball or a masquerade, have we 
not come home very well contented to pull off our 
ornaments and fine clothes, in order to go to rest ? 
Such methinks is the reception we naturally give to 
the warnings of our bodily decays; they seem to 
undress us by degrees, to prepare us for a rest that 
will refresh us far more powerfully than any night's 
sleep could do. We shall then find no weariness 
from the &tigues which either our bodies or our 
minds have undergone ; but all tears shall be wiped 
from our eyes, and sorrow, and crying, and pain shall 
be no more : we shall then without weariness 
move in our new vehicles, and transport ourselves 
from one part of the skies to another, with much 
more ease and velocity than we could have done in 
the prime of our strength, upon the fleetest horses, 
the distance of a mile. This cheerful prospect 
enables us to see our strength fail, and await the 



CHBISTIAN BTJBIAL. 43 

tokens of approaching dissolution with a kind of 
awful pleasure/ 

I have just referred to the difficulty of the great, 
rich, and prosperous of this world, recognising death 
as only the advent of a happier life ; of their meet- 
ing death as a friend, a liberator ; of looking on the 
dark valley merely as a pathway, a dreary one, 'tis 
true, but still as a path to home. It is difficult to 
the great and happy, far more so than to the afflicted 
and destitute: we have our Saviour's authority to 
say so. But this duchess — ^the chosen friend of an 
excellent queen, the happy wife of a lofty nobleman, 
the loving mother of a promising son, the courted 
companion of the rich and great, the flattered mis- 
tress of lofty mansions and wide domains — did yet 
live here as m the world, not of it ; and amidst all 
the beguilements of a prosperous career did she 
illustrate as much as the desolate pauper who came 
to solicit my aid, as much did she personally ex- 
emplify, that the grave is but the threshold of 

HOME. 

A modern poet of the highest reputation writes of 
us regarding that ' Sabbath of Sabbaths,' the future 
life— 

The purest height to which our wisdom goes, 
Is hut the mere negation of our woes ; 
'Mid our contentions thou art gracious peace. 
Unto the weary thou art calm repose. 



44 god's acbs. 

To prisoners gall'd with cluuns thon art release, 
And to the mourner thou a place where sorrows cease. 

To wanderers toss'd on the tempestuous main. 
Thou art beyond the storm a quiet shore ;— 
To heartsick hopes a stay that shall sustain ;— 
To needy men thou art celestial store ; — 
To hearts bereav'd where Mends shall part no more. 
And love shall need no mora the chast'ning rod ; — ^' 
To penitents the land where sin is o'er j— 
To virgin souls a floor by angels trod ;— 
To saintly men a {dace where they shaU see their God. 

There are no evening shades — no setting sun, — 
There is no fkll of the autumnal leaf, — 
No age o'ertaking life but j^t begun, — 
No gloom,, and no decay, no parting grief;— 
For joy below is nought but pain's relief; 
Words that would speak it do but syllable 
How poor it is, how shadowy and brief. 
blessed place beside that living well. 
Thou only know'st not that sad sweet word Farewell. 

I have quoted largely, but I could not bring my- 
self to garble the last beautiful extract. And if it 
be true— and the writer is well versed in the human 
heart — if it be true that our highest anticipations of 
a future life — ours — do but comprise *a mere 
negation of our woes,' — what must have been those 
of the mere heathen philosopher ? Poor indeed 1 

It is perhaps hardly possible that we, in these 
luxurious days, wearing our religion so easily, like a 



nmliii Tin ' ' ■■^■T'*--" ■> --< 



CHRISTUN BUBIAL. 45 

loose robe, fitting it off or on as best suits our spirits 
and temperament at the moment — it is, I say, not 
possible that we can realize the feelings of highly 
minded, highly educated, scientific, enlightened, and 
amiable pagans, when the 'tidings of great joy' 
were first breathed into their ears and hearts ; when 
they were told that the enlightenment they culti* 
vated, and the innocent pleasures they enjoyed here, 
were but the foretaste, if they so willed, of enlighten- 
ment and nobler joy to be for ever and for ever 
hereafter. 

If these were beneficent news to the patricians of 
the world, what must they have been to the toil- 
worn, the pauper, the Helot, and the slave ? If the 
converted philosopher rejoiced with exceeding great 
joy in the idea of the perpetuation hereafter of his 
pleasures of science and mind, what must the out- 
casts of the earth, accustomed to feel that they were 
bom to want and servitude, misery and slavery un- 
redeemable, closed by death and annihilation — what 
must they have felt when they learnt that to them 
also was there a future free from pain and penury, 
free from stripes and servitude, where their tears 
would fall no more, and they should be for ever 
as loved children in the presence of their Great 
Father ! 

How beautifully are this peace, this joy, this 



46 god's acbe. 

radiant angel-hued hope evinoed in and illustrated 
by the conduct of some of the early martyrs. 

Look at the self-possession, the calm and holy 
peace and constancy of Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, 
a disciple of the Evangelist St. John, and who suffered 
martyrdom under Trajan, A«D. 108. The epistles 
ascribed to him were penned during the journey to 
Eome,Vhither he was being conveyed, chained night 
and day to his guards, for the express purpose of 
martyrdom, his sentence being to be thrown to wild 
beasts. Admire the steadfastness of his faith ! With 
this certain result before him, not in the uncertain 
distance, but nearing it every hour, what must have 
been the placid confidence, the faithful hope, the 
triumphant conviction which enabled him, utterly 
unmindful of self, to spend these last hours in writing 
for the benefit of his fellow-creatures ! 

St. Folycarp, the last of the apostolical fathers, a 
friend and companion too of the blessed disciple, 
was near ninety years old when he suffered martyr- 
dom. The soldiers sent to capture him seemed 
touched with pity, and exclaimed, ^ Was there need 
of all this care to take such an old man ?' He might 
probably have escaped, but he would not After 
being threatened with various cruelties, he was con- 
demned to be burnt. 

He refused to be nailed to the stake, as was usual, 



CHRISTIAN BUBIAL. 47 

saying, ' Let me alone as I am ; for He who has 
given me strength to endure the fire, will also enable 
me to stand without moving in the pila' 

And so, even thus placidly, he passed through his 
fiery trial to his everlasting rest. 

And these sublime examples of endurance 'for 
righteousness' sake,' these exemplars of the faith, the 
hope, the joy of the redeemed Christian, were 
emulated, indeed were fully equalled by women. 
St Perpetua, who, with others, was martyred A.D. 
203, offers one of the most touching among the many 
interesting histories recorded of those fearful times.' 

For her domestic circumstances added a sting to 
her trials: she had an aged father who almost 
idolized her, and she had a young infant at the 
breast ; but her constancy never failed. A slight 
tribute, even the appea/rcmce of homage to the genius 
of Csesar, would have saved her ; but the principle 
would have been yielded. When her father threw 
himself on the ground before her, entreating her to 
have pity on his grey hairs, she replied — 

' My father, grieve not ; nothing will happen but 
what pleases God ; for we are not at our own disposal/ 

A more bitter moment still was that when, during 
the trial, he suddenly appeared before her with her 
infant in his arms. 

She was exposed to the attack of a wild cow, 



48 god's acre. 

which threw her down and wounded her. She had 
thought and care, even then, to raise herself, and 
dispose her garments with womanly delicacy about 
her. Her suflferings were brought to an eod by the 
sword of the gladiator. 

But I must dwell no longer on these matters, 
deeply interesting as they are, and recorded, may it 
not be said without irreverence, for our example, on 
whom the ends of the world are come ; that is, who, 
living in a Christian country, and in the light of the 
acknowledged gospel, are not called, God be blessed ! to 
give so fearful a testimony ' to the faith that is in us.' 

It cannot therefore excite our surprise that, under 
the early impetus, the first impulse of the certainty 
of resurrection, and the hope of a happy eternity, 
the consignment to the tomb was denuded of many 
of the dismal and disheartening circumstances which 
attached to the formula of paganism. The earliest 
Christians were, probably because of the bitter per- 
secution to which they were subjected in the per- 
formance of their rites, obliged to bury in secresy and 
darkness, under cover of the night ; but only for that 
reason was night-time chosen* For in principh 

With tapers in the face of day. 
These rites their faithful hope display ; 

In long procession slow, 
With hymns that fortify the heart. 

And prayers that soften woe. 



CHBISTIAK BURIAL. 49 

In pagan rites by night torches were necessarily 
borne, but the early Christians used them in full 
daylight as emblems of joyful hope. To these we 
shall refer mose fully. 

Instead of hired mourners shrilly keening dismal 
strains, they carried the corpse to the grave, the face 
bare, chanting psalms and hymns, not of the lugu- 
brious strain now so usual, the ' dirges due ' alike 
real and poetical, but of hope, of joy, of holy anti- 
cipation; referring rather to the glory hereafter 
than to the bereavement now.^ Their rites, though 
performed with humility, and chastened it may be 
by tears, did yet assume somewhat of triumphant 
aspect, which relieved those most closely connected, 
most severely bereaved, from some of the bitterest 
feelings of separation. 

And these solemn offerings of prayer and praise 
were invariably accompanied by almsgiving; the 
poor and the needy were always remembered. This 
was the origin of those * Funeral Doles ^ which after- 



^ It was the prevalent custom at Hatherleigh, a small town in 
Devonshire, to ring a lively peal on the church heUs after a 
funeral, as elsewhere after a wedding ; and it is said that the 
parishioners are perfectly reconciled to this practice by the con- 
sideiation that the deceased has exchanged a life of care for one 
of rest and peace. 

E 



50 CK>D'3 acbs. 

wards (see diap. xiii.) became ^ component part of 
a respectable person's funeral 

From the time that Constantine ascended the 
throne the Christens had free privilege to int^ their 
dead, and the j performed these rites in open day. 
JBefore this time it was a r^nement in onehy with 
their persecutors to interfere with the sacred duty of 
burkd. 

In reverence to Him who assumed the body of 
man for our salvation, who sitteth at the right hand 
of his Father on high, and who shall come again in 
the body to judge the quick and the dead for their 
deeds done in the flesh — ^in reverence to this, and to 
the dose connexioii between the body lowered into 
the grave and the one that shall arise from it — ^the 
early Christians were always anxious, if possible, to 
lay the whole body, unmutUated, in the earth ; espe- 
cially considering, what is too often lost sight of, that 
the dead, the holy dead, are in the communion of 
saints, still and for ever. 

If we remember that even among pagan nations 
this * corporal act of mercy,' the burial of the dead, 
was not only considered a peremptory duty by the 
thoughtful, but was enforced by legal enactments on 
the observance of the most careless, it will not excite 
our surprise that, under the elevating influence of 



CHBISTIAN BURIAL. 5 1 

Hm Ohristian doctrine of the resurrection of the body, 
it should receive a reverence unknown and unneces- 
sary where it was considered merely as a piece of 
eormption, a decaying carcase. Now, this outer 
covering was reverenced as the temple of the Holy 
Spirit^ as the germ whence should spring a scion 
ripe for immortality. Therefore was the body 
watched and tended with solemn, unremitting, reve- 
rent care ; thei'efore was it never left from the 
death-hour to that of its commitment to the grave ; 
therefore was it borne thither with all the amenities 
of honourable tendance ; and therefore, finally, was it 
ocHsmntted to the dust with psalms and hymns of 
faith, of reverence, of hope, of anticipated reunion. 

That the eaifly Christians very commonly used the 
process of embalmment was probably owing to the 
necessity which compelled them, in those fearful 
times, to deposit the remains of the dead in the 
places, close and subterranean, where they were 
accustomed to meet periodically for worship. 

And yet not this only. Though embalmment was a 
usual custom of the Jews, the Christian practice had 
perhaps a hallowed reference to our Saviour, whose 
sacred body they 'woimd in linen clothes with the 
spices as the manner of the Jews is to bury' — 'a 
mixture of myrrh and aloes about an hundred 
pounds weight' 



50, god's acre. 

Their places of burial were called by a general 
name, ccemeteria, 'dormitories' pr * sleeping places,^ 
because they looked on death as a sleep merely, and 
the departed only as it were laid to rest until the 
resurrection should awaken them.^ 

Now this refinement in cruelty to which I have 
referred, their pagan foes exhibited by exposing the 
bodies of the Christian martyrs to beasts and birds of 
prey, in utter scorn of the newly-taught doctrines of 
Bedemption and Resurrection. Sometimes, after re- 
taining the bodies for many days above ground, they 
burned them and threw the ashes into a river. This 
was the case with the martyrs of Lyons and Vieime 
in France, whose ashes were cast into the Ehone 
with scornful mockery. This persecution was in the 
year A.D. 179. Many expired from their sufferings 
under the cruelties inflicted on them before the deli- 
berate martyrdom commenced. Amongst these was 
Paulinus, Bishop of Lyons, who died in prison from 
the kicks and cuffs he had received from the populace 
two days befora 

But this outrage to the remains, distressing as it 
was to their feelings, would not shake the faith of 



* 'Eequletorium* was a term used later on. 
' The bodies are not only despoiled of all funerall ornaments, 
but digged up out of their requietories.' 



CHBISTIAI^r BtJEIAL. 53 

the Christians ; it would, however, fully account for 
the care and zeal with which relics of martyrs were 
in those days preserved, without touching on the 
later error of any special or communicating virtue in 
the relics themselves! 

The body of Polycarp was thus burnt, the ashes 
carefully preserved. * We afterwards took up the 
bones more precious than the richest jewels or gold, 
and deposited them decently in a place at which 
may God grant us to assemble with joy, to celebrate 
the birthday of the martyr/ 

His tomb is still shown with great veneration at 
Smyrna, in a small chapel.^ 

Among the classical nations it was considered, as 
we have written, * shameful' to neglect a corpse, but 
the early Christians carried this charity to a much 
higher pitch ; and during times of persecution they 
not only incurred enormous expense, but braved 
great personal risk in order to obtain for burial the 
bodies of their brethren. When neither money nor 
solicitation would avail, they frequently stole them in 
the night Eutychianus, Bishop of Rome, is cele- 



* Mr. Pridden, in his "History of the Early Christians^ says 
that his brethren were not allowed to have the remains of Poly- 
carp. Bingham (from Eusebins) says the disciples were per- 
mitted quietly to gather his bones.— Ort^tW*, book iii. chap. 9. 



54 ood's acre. 

brated in the Martyrology for having buried 34^ 
martyrs in several places, with his own hands. 

Though luxury, cost, and magnificence Q splendid in 
ashes, pompous in the grave ^ of course gained 
groimd despite the invectives of the early fathers 
against it, the usual funeral attire was new white 
linen. They clothed the dead in new garment3 to 
signify or prefigure the putting on the 'new clothing 
of incorruption/^ 

By degrees, however, this primitive custom of 
propriety and purity became habituaUy disregarded, 
as it had been 0€C€t8i(moiMy even &om the first 
The habits of splendour, dignity, and ceremony to 
which persons were habituated in their Ufetime, were 
borne even into the tomb. Thus emperors and kings 
were interred in their imperial and royal robes ; 
knights in their miHtary garments ; bishops were 
laid in the grave in their episcopal habits ; priests in 
their sacerdotal vestments ; and mon^s in the dress 
of the particular order to which they belonged. An 
ancient ritual of the monastery of Silos in Spain, 
expressly orders that the deceased be habited suitably 
to their rank in life. 



^ John Bradford, burned by the Papists in i555» 'was pre- 
sented with his knartyr-dress of white. He took occasion from it 
topraj that he might be found clothed in the wedding garment.' 



CHBISITAK fiUBIAL. 55 

Yarious customs obtained indeed from time to 
time which had been better honoured in the neglect 
than the observance, such, for instance, as that in 
old time of burying the priors of Durham in their 
boot& A decent uniformity of attire has now super- 
seded these unbecoming customa^ 

Lights were carried before the dead as symbols of 
the glory to which they aspired ; to signify also that 
they were champions or conquerors, and as such 
conducted in triumph to their graves. We have a 
record of a mother carrying a torch in her hand 
before the body of her son; the bishops themselves 
carried torches around the bier of the Lady Paula ; 
the mangled body of St Cyprian was buried with 
great pomp, many torches being borne around. St. 
Gregory of Nazianzen says that at the funeral of his 
sister Macrina a great number of deacons and clergy 
walked on each side the coffin carrying lighted 
torches J and when the body of St Chzysostom was 



^ So amongst the Bomans, magistrates and military men 
were wrapped in their purple robes of honour, or other varied 
and rich garments, and persons of rank and fortune were burnt 
in their official habits. 

The Emperor Nero was habited in doth of gold; but the 
general drapery of the dead was black for the very poor, white 
for others. * 

The Greeks were buried in white, as were robed the assistants 
at their public funerals. 



^6 god's ache. 

removed from Comaiia to Constantinople^ Hhere was 
such a multitude of people met him in ships in his 
passage over the Bosphorus, that the sea was covered 
with lamps.' ^ 

The corpse was usually carried to burial on the 
shoulders of friends ; and the highest order of clergy 
thought it no reproach to their dignity to carry the 
bier. At the funeral of the Lady Paula bishops were 
what we now call under-bearers. There were strict 
regulations regarding the practice. Deacons were to 
carry deacons, and priests to be the bearers of priesta 
Women were never allowed to act as under-bearers. 

When a bishop died it was usual to cany his 
corpse into several churches before it was borne to 
its last resting-place. The body was usually laid on 
a bed of ivy, or laurel, or other evergreen. Gregory 
of Tours says that the Bishop Saint Valerius was laid 
in his tomb on a bed of laurel leaves. 

The poor were buried in coffins of plain wood at 
the common charge of the Church ; but this duty was 
not left to indiscriminate care. Early in the fourth 



^ Lamps have been found in the tombs of the first Christians, 
inscribed A and 12, and with the figure of the Gk>od Shepherd. 

Camden and Weever relate that, at the suppression and demo- 
lition of the abbeys in York, f)uming lamps were found in many 
tombs, the flame of which, it was said, could not be extinguished 
by wind or water. 



CHRISTIAN BURUL. 57 

century two classes were instituted whose specific 
vocation was to solace the sick, and pay due and re- 
quisite attention to the dead. The one were called 
parabolani, from yenturing their lives among the 
sick in contagious disorders; the other copiatse, 
laborantes, lecticarii, fossarii, sandapilarii, and decani, 
whose office was to dig graves for the poor, carry the 
coffins, deposit them in the ground, &c., as most of 
the names signify. 

These officers, kept then under the rigid discipline 
and surveillance of the Church, are the progenitors of 
the fruitful progeny of undertakers, sextons, &c. &c., 
w&o in these days cause many a half-heartbroken 
person to count with despair the few coins in a purse 
which perhaps has been impoverished by the hand 
of God himself in heavy, long, lingering sicknesa 

The body of the departed Christian was, as we 
have observed, always reverently watched, by prayer- 
ful friends, from the hour of death to that of inter- 
ment; sometimes in the house, more often in the 
church. The corpse of St. Ambrose was carried to 
the church and watched there ; that of Monica was 
tended by night and day in her own house. Gregory 
Nyssen writes that over the remains of his sister 
Macrina ' they watched and sang psalms all night, as 
they were used to do on the vigils or pemoctations 
preceding the festivals of the martyr&^ 



58 god's aobe* 

' When the period for interment came, the corpse 
waB carried to the grave with psalmody, torches being 
borne around. 

Funerals were not merely denuded of gloom and 
sadness, but were invested with somewhat of jubilant 
fdat. Sorrow there must have been, but it was grief 
without bittemesa In the wonderful light which 
newly beamed from Calvary, the Christians, ^the 
first-bom of a young faith,' in their unlooked-for 
and exceeding joy, thotight more practically than we 
that death was but the dark passage which carried 
their lost relative from their view to the presence of 
God, his Saviour, to the society of their friends and 
brethren, to the companionship of the just and good 
of eternal ages. He was, in that hour they felt, he 
was but * gone before*' 

Such versides as these they chatited on their way 
to the grave : — 

* Eetum to thy test, my soul, for the Lord hath 
rewarded thea' 

' The memory of the just shall be blessed/ 

* The souls of the righteous are in the hand of Qod.* 

* I will fear no evil because thou art with ma' 

^ Precious in the sight of the Lord is the deatii of 
his saints / and 

* Hallelujah I Thou art the Resurrection, Thou 

Christ' 



CHBISTUN BURIAL. J9 

None weire denied this privilc^ge of psalmody at 
their funeral except stiicides, or criming who were 
publidy executed^ or those who died in the wilful 
neglect of holy baptism. 

If the Hfe of the departed, or his character, had 
been marked by any drcumstances available as ex- 
ample to others, some few words were spoken as a 
just memorial of his merit, and with reference to 
him as a pattern for those around Several of these 
funeral orations, made in the early ages of Chris- 
tianity, are still extant 

If the interment were in the forenoon the whole 
service of the Church was gone through, and the 
Holy Eucharist was administered ; if it were after- 
noon, the psalmody and prayers only, accompanied by 
the more especial funeral service. 

This service consisted of hymns of thanksgiving 
for the deceased, with prayer for our own entering 
into that eternal rest. The bishop gave solemn 
thanks to Qt)d for his (the departed's) perse vers^nce 
in the knowledge of Qod, and in his Christian war- 
fare even unto death; and the deacon read such 
portions of Scripture as contained the promises of 
the resurrection. A hymn to the same purpose was 
sung. 

During the celebration of the Holy Communion, 
in those days, a solemn commemoration was made of 



6o god's acre. 

the dead in general, and prayers were offered to the 
Almighty for them. And this was one especial 
reason for the adoption of this service at burials, 
because prayers were constantly made therein for all 
holy men and holy women departed, among whom 
was especially named him about to be committed to 
the grava 

But in these early days the praying for the dead 
was quite independent of the later accruing error 
and belief in purgatory. It was rather an argument 
and acknowledgment that those gone before were 
still in being, and living with the Lord. These dip- 
tychs of the dead are still read on certain appointed 
days in the Roman Catholic Church ; but probably 
even from this simple and touching record and 
memorial of the virtues of martyrs and good men 
departed, might arise the great abuse of saint- 
worship.^ 

The 'kiss of peace' is spoken of, and the anointing 
with holy oil, as the last rites of all ; but these seem 



^ The annual commemoration of departed saints was originally 
celebrated on the ist of May ; but by order of Pope Gregory IV. 
(▲.D. 8^) it was removed to a more appropriate period, the 
close of the Christian year. Our reformers, in expunging the 
numberless saints'-days which crowded the calendar, have re- 
tained this, wherein we bless God for all His servants departed 
in His faith and fear, whether those known ones whose ' praise 



CHRISTIAN BURIAL. 6 1 

not to have been always observed. It was very usual 
to strew flowers on the grave ; and no old writer, how 
rigid soever, has reprobated this innocent, beautiful, 
and most suggestive custom. 

And so, full filled with the grace and benediction 
of Him whom they had learnt to know as their 
Father in Heaven, as their Redeemer to all eternity, 
in faith and hope, in the exercise of prayer and alms- 
giving, the early Christians were enabled to *give 
hearty thanks ' to Almighty Ood that he had been 
pleased to ^ deliver their brother out of the miseries 
of this sinful world.' 



is in the Chnrches/ or those meek and obscure ones whose ' life 
was hid with Christ in 6U>d.' 

The Collect which we now use is modgm, having been com- 
posed anew in 1549; but the appropriate Scripture for the 
Epistle, and the beautiful Gospel, are the same as used in early 
times — ^the one the sublime enumeration by the inspired disciple 
of faithful and holy servants who had the ' seal of the living 
Grod ;' the other the divine and touching description of those 
mourners, those poor in spirit, those mercIM and pure in heart, 
who alone may hope to enter the Holy Courts above. 



64 god's acke. 

St. Jerome says, ^ it was his custom, when he was 
a boy at school in Borne, on Sundays, to go about 
and visit the sepulchres of the apostks and martyrs, 
and often to enter into the vaults, which were digged 
deep into the ground, and on each side, as one went 
in, had along by the walls the bodies of such as lay 
buried ; and were so daxk, that to enter them was, in 
the Psalmist's language, ^almost like going down 
alive into hell ;' the light from above peeped in but 
here and there, a little to take off the horrors of 
darkness, not so much by windows as little holes and 
crannies, which still left a dark night within, and 
terrified the minds of such as had the curiosity to 
visit them with silence and horror/ 

As to the multitude, the healthful and rightful 
rule of extra-mural interment continued for five 
centuries; but long before this period had elapsed 
innovations had been made, at first with a scrupulous 
care, which gradually abated, until at length in- 
fringements of the main rule became multiplied all 
.but irremediably, as we shall proceed to show. 

There is a homely and pungent epitaph which 

runs thus: — 

Here I lie beside the door, 
Here I lie because Tm poor $ 
Purther in the more they pay. 
Here I lie as well as thej. 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 6^ 

This was not perhaps without its just application 
formerly. Now, rather would we write — ' 

Here all are equal. Side by side, 
The poor man and the son of pride 
Lie calm and still — 

for in the sight of God, and to the belief of the 
humble Christian, this must ever be so, howsoever 
worldly ordinances may require outward distinctions 
of pomp and show. * I die in deep humility, know- 
ing that all are alike before the Throne of God,' 
were the last written words of our excellent Queen 
Dowager Adelaide; and in conformity with this 
earnest feeling, or rather conviction, she ordained 
that her funeral rites should be divested of much 
of the pomp and circumstance usually surrounding 
those of her rank and station. 

When the honour of a State funeral was proposed 
for Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Goulburn, his executor, read 
a declaration (signed by Sir Robert on the 8th of 
March, 1844) in these words : — 

*I desire that I may be buried in the vault, in 
the parish church of Drayton Manor, in which my 
father and mother were buried, and that my funeral 
may be without any ostentation or parade of any 
kind.' And the well-known John Evelyn records of 
his mother, that on her death-bed she importuned 
his father ' that what he designed to bestow upon 

F 



66 god's ACER • 

her funeral^ he would rather dispose among the 
poor/ 

Sir Matthew Hale directed that his body should be 
buried in the plainest manner, and he himself die- 
tated an epitaph, the simplest possible. He, I think 
it was, who wafi so scrupulous to avoid any especial 
appearance of sanctity, lest^ by a falling ofif in his 
own pra<^tice, he should bring discredit on the Chris* 
tian profession. 

It is said that Bishop Hall punctually foretold the 
night of his death, and accordingly gave orders for 
the time and manner of his funeral. He desired to 
be buried without amy funeral pomp^ at the dis- 
cretion of his executors, with this only monition, that 
he did not hold God's house a meet repository for 
the dead bodies of the greatest saints. 

Archbishop Parker also prescribed and set down 
in writing the order to be observed at his funeral. 
He appointed his tombstone, of black marble, to be 
fitted up before his death, that he might look upon 
it while he lived. His tomb also he had erected 
whilst he was alive, the workmanship whereof was 
not eocquisitey hut plain. 

Bishop Sanderson wrote, ^ It is my will that no 
costly monument be erected for my memory, hut only 
a fair flat marble stone he laid over me. And I do 
very wAwh desire my will rriay he ca/refully observed 



m>^ « * ««O W W P ' 



CHUECHES AND CHUECHYARDS. 6j 

herevrij hoping it may become exemplaiy to some 
one or other; at least, however, testifying at my 
death — what I have so earnestly professed in my life- 
time — my utter dislike of the vast expenses laid out 
in funeral solemnities, with very little benefit to any, 
which, if bestowed in pious and charitable works, 
might redound to the public or private benefit of 
many persons.' 

This is all in accordance with the teaching of the 
Church in the earliest times. St Basil says, * For 
what need have you of a sumptuous monument or a 
costly entombing? What advantage is there in a 
fruitless expense ? Prepare your own funeral while 
you live. Works of charity and mercy are the 
funeral obsequies you can bestow upon yourself/ 
And we are told of the Lady Paula, who during her 
lifetime distributed her whole substance in alms, and 
who never suflFered a poor person to be interred with- 
out a funeral garment, that she ' wished not to have 
anything at her death, but that she might be be- 
holden for a winding-sheet to the charity of others.' 

There can be no impropriety, so that it be done 
with good taste and modesty, in maintaining that 
distinction of style and expenditure to the grave 
which it has pleased Providence to appoint in life. 
It is only when vain ostentation supersedes a due 
regard to the circumstances of the deceased and his 

F 2 



68 god's acre. 

survivors, that ' pomp and circumstance ' become im- 
proper to be engrafted on that decent ceremonial to 
which nature and duty alike point as fitting tributes 
to the departed. 

Unfortunately this pomp and circumstance, not 
only in too many cases cover indifference, but they 
have become engrafted on our natural habits, until 
in numberless instances in middle and lower life, the 
wholesome and heart-softening tears of a survivor are 
checked in their source, by terror of the inevitable 
expense of that which custom prescribes as ' a decent 
funeral' 

The Church lost not sight of her members with 
their death; her reverent care extended to that 
inanimate body which she recognises as laid in the 
earth only for a little time. One of her early ordi- 
nances runs thus : — 

*Let him (ie., the parish priest) shrive him, 
give him housel, and extreme unction, and, after 
death, carefully order, and allow not any absurdity 
with the corpse, but, with the fear of God, bury it 
wisely.' * 

Many a widow and orphan in these days has 
lasting cause to lament that the modern mode 
of interment is anything but wise. Public atten- 



^ One of the canons enacted under King Edgar in the tenth 
oentuiy. 



CHUBCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 69 

tion has of late been strenuously called to this 
subject 

My readers will need no apology from me for 
placing before them the following admirably written 
remarks on this subject I must premise that, 
according to the writer, it has been stated that four 
millions are annually squandered on what are termed 
the ' mere fopperies ' of death. 

'This estimate does not include the vain marble, 
the ' storied urn and animated bust,' and the embla- 
zoned hatchment of monumental affectation and pa- 
rade. To what then does it go ? To silk scarfs and brass 
nails, feathers for the horses, kid gloves and gin for 
the mutes, white satin and black cloth for the worms. 
And whom does it benefit? Not those in whose 
honour all this pomp is marshalled ; not those who 
often at a costly magnificence submit to it as a 
trammel of custom ; not those whose unfeigned 
sorrow makes them callous at the moment to its 
show, and almost to its mockery ; not the cold spec- 
tator, who sees its dull magnificence give the pal- 
pable lie to the preacher's equality of death : but the 
lowest of all low hypocrites, the hired mourner, whose 
office it is a sin to sanction and encouraga There is 
a time in every family when one room in the house 
of the living is the chamber of death ; when words 
are whispered low, aud the smile is checked, and the 



70 * god's acek 

light of the Bun is darkened, and the sternest master 
is mUd, aud the most bustling servant is still, and no 
one has the heart to choose the wood for the coffin, 
or haggle about the price of broadcloth. Then, when 
false shame or true affection makes us puppets in the 
hands of others, a mercenary strangei 



Like a ghole of the East, with quick scent for the dead — 

* undertakes ' the mesusure and evidences of our grief, 
and by ' only what is customary,' is at once the 
arbiter, and du-ector, and purveyor of the trappings 
of woe, taking his own orders, and charging his own 
prices, according as he may estimate the pride, or 
piety, or purse of his helpless employers/ 

The remarks of thid writer are fully corroborated 
by the Government Beports on the subject. * Funeral 
charges have become in the highest degree extortion* 
ate, and against this extortion it is not in the power 
of any private person to protect himselC All classes feel 
the bondage in which they are held. * I have known 
people put up with any extortion,^ says a witness, him- 
self one of the most extensive undertakers in the 
metropolis, ' rather than dispute a bill for a funeral' 
In one instance the bill charged was 22o2.t— it should 
not have been more than lool. ; but families will 
put up with any extortion, as they did in this case, 
to prevent legal proceedings.' 



CHURCHES AND CHUHCHTARDa 7 1 

But I proceed to observe that whereas, in these 
days, differences of rank and wealth alone mark the 
various distinctions in burial, in early times it was 
very much otherwise. The personal sanctity or holy 
deeds of a man in life formed the only claim for an 
honourable place of interment— honourable meaning 
that it was more honourable to be interred within the 
walls of a church than in the churchyard, and most 
hcmourable to be laid near the altar. So early began 
that error, the corruption of that great tenet of Chris- 
tianity, the equality of all men in the sight of God, 
which has deteriorated to thd present great abuses, 
the appropriation of vaulted chambers or conspicuous 
tombs to the rich, while the poor are huddled wherever 
there may chance to be space. 

Yet was this error in its commencement not the 
mere vulgar attribute of wealth and rank, but it 
originated in the impression and belief in the holmeaa 
of the East (where the Altai* was always placed) ; to 
which impression we have referred more fully in 
chap. xvi« 

For the first five hundred years of the Christian 
era the old practice of extra»mural interment was, as 
we have remarked, most generally followed ; only 
royal personages were allowed to be buried within 
the city, and these not in the church, but in the 
atrium, or churchyard before the church, or, as the 



*j% god's acre. 

Emperor Constantine, in the porch. In the sixth 
century this discipline was greatly relaxed, and the 
people \rere admitted to the privilege of the atrium. 

Durandus^ tells us that of old, people were buried 
in their own houses, a custom which of necessity was 
soon put an end to (it is, however, spoken of as 
common amongst the Greeks, and also in the early 
days of Rome) ; and that the rich were afterwards 
interred in their own grounds, or at the summit, the 
middle, or the feet of hilla 

In France, before the gift to the people, by Philip 
Augustus, of that part of the royal domains which 
afterwards became known as the Cemetery of the 
Innocents, individuals were allowed to bury their 
friends in their cellars, courts, and gardens ; and in- 
terments frequently took place in the streets, on the 
high roads, and in the public fields.^ 

The spirit of the Church was always opposed to 
ipterment in churches, though the Emperor Theo- 
dosius was the first who made a law against it The 
principle was ever practically set aside in regard of 
bishops, prelates, and persons famed for their sanctity,, 
who were interred nearer to or further from the high 

^ Rationale Divm, Offm, 
^ Mungo Park says that the negroes have no appropriate 
burial-places, and frequently dig the grave in the floor of the 
deceased's hut, or in the shade of a favourite tree. 



CHURCHES AND CHUECHYARDS. 73 

altar ; whilst founders of churches were usually buried 
within the porch ; and by degrees, the privilege of 
interment in the church came to be extended to the 
laity, subject to the consent and approbation of the 
clergyman thereof; and it so continued until strong 
measures were adopted to put an end to the practice. 

In the ninth century a claim was made in France 
to graves in the church as an hereditw7 right This 
was, however, strenuously opposed at that time, though 
granted at a later period. About the year 1270 a 
sort of hereditary right to the sepuldhres of their 
ancestors was acknowledged. CTot long after, it was 
spoken of as a customary thing.^ 

In the tenth century, the twionty-ninth of the 
canons enacted in King Edgar's reign (referred to 
above) ran thus^ — 

' And w<e enjoin that no man be buried within a 
church, unless it be known that he in life was so 
acceptable to God, that, on that account, it be ad- 
mitted that he is worthy of such a grave.' 



^ By the common law, no person in England can be baried in 
any church without the consent of the incumbent ; and this not 
only respecting his freehold, but because he is the sole compe- 
tent judge of the worthiness of the party requesting this. 

One exception is allowed : if a burying-place has been attached 
by prescription to a manor-house, it becomes a freehold. The 
fee given to the parish is for repairing the floor. 



74 god's acbe. 

For by that time so much inconvenience had 
accrued from the practice of interment in churches, 
that a rule was made in the Council of Tribur, which 
seems to have obtained in England. It was as fol^ 
lows : — 

'Let no layman for the future be buried in the 
church ; yet such bodies as are already buried there 
may not be cast out, but the pavement shall be so 
made over the graves that no footstep of a grave 
shall appear. And if this cannot, without great 
difficulty, be done, for the multitude of corpses buried 
there, let the place be turned into a polyandrium, or 
' cemetery,' and let the altar be removed thence, and 
set in some other place, where the sacrifice may be 
religiously offered. to God/* 

The reason given by Pope Gregory the Great for 
permitting interment in churches tallies in some sort 
with the one quoted above, referred by Bingham to 
Varro, viz., ^ that the sight of the tombs of the dead 
might move the living to say prayers for their 
souls.' 

At the Council of Winchester, under Archbishop 
Lanfranc, anno 1076, a more stringent order was 
made : — 

* Let NO bodies of the dead be buried in churches.' 

^ Showing that the Holy Sacrament was always administered 
at a funeral. 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 75 

With exceptions, of course ; and subsequent re* 
iterated decrees prove that it was no hard matter to 
obtain the privilege. 

In the Anglo-Saxon times it was not unusual to 
lay the bodies on the surface of the ground (even 
when the interment was in the church), and to cover 
them with earth and stone. So that in many in^ 
stances the holy edifices were rendered unfit for the 
celd>ration of Divine service. 

Cardinal Bourbon, Archbishop of Bouen, decreed 
in council, 158 1, that 'not even the rich' should be 
buried in churches ; that ' the honour not being to be 
paid to wealth, but to the grace of the Holy Spirit, 
should be reserved for those who are especially con- 
secrated to God, and their bodies temples of Jesus 
Christ and the Holy Ghost ; for those who have held 
any dignities ecclesiastical or secular, and are really 
and truly ministers of God, and instruments of the 
Holy Spirit ; and for those who, by their virtues or 
merits, have done service to God and the State. 
Cemeteries are reserved for all others.^ 

Yet, as I intimated, there were various degrees of 
honour within the church walls : as, for instance, the 
place for rectors and vicars was near the altar, or in 
the church; for chaplains and chantry priests, in 
their respective chapels and religious houses; and 
lords of manors, patrons, and founders were also 



76 god's acbk 

often interred in the church, but very frequently 
within the porch. Constantine the Great was buried 
in the porch of the church which he had erected. 
Leofric, Earl of Mercia, and his celebrated Countess 
Godiva, were buried in the porches of the abbey 
church at Coventry, which they had founded. It 
were easy to multiply instances. 

In cathedrals and conventual churches, bishops and 
abbots were buried in chapels, erected by themselves, 
and dedicated to the saint under whose especial pro- 
tection they put themselves. 

In France, at a much later period, a decree was 
published that none but archbishops, bishops, and 
curates, patrons, founders, and lords who held 
supreme courts of judicature, should be buried in 
churches; all other persons in churchyards ; and that 
they should be as fax from the town as possible. 

This seems to have been a measure always, in old 
time, whether pa^n or Christian, most sedulously 
inculcated — ^that the resting-place of the dead should 
not be in the very midst of the living. This abuse 
has, however, crept upon us almost imperceptibly, 
until in our day it is a x;rying evil. It is a most 
natural and xeligious ordinance that cemeteries 
should at first have been placed near or round 
churches ; in fact, if we refer to the early Christian 
burial, a consecrated church, with an altar where the 



CHUBCHES AND CHUBCHYARDS. 77 

Holy Communion may be received, appears indis- 
pensable. But, probably, in ninety-nine cases out of 
a hundred, the churches of old time were built ori- 
ginally in open districts, population having subse- 
quently increased and crowded round them. 

St. Paul's Cathedral, in London, was originally the 
site of a Roman temple. In clearing the foundation 
of the old Christian church destroyed by the Great 
Fire, Sir Christopher Wren discovered at the north 
side a large burjdng-place — one of great antiquity : 
for underneath the graves of later centuries he found 
a row of Saxon graves ; beneath these were Roman 
coins and potsherds, and also many relics, as ivory 
and wooden pins, which gave testimony of ancient 
British appropriation. 

The ancient parochial churches dependent on 
abbeys had commonly a cemetery near them, and 
the dead were buried there, in the parvis or atrium 
of the church, whence it has been supposed that 
atrium came to signify a cemetery.^ . 

It was, we are told, for the sake of the protection 
which would be afforded them by consecrated ground, 
baptized bells and relics, that bodies were interred 



^ Before many of the churches of Ravenna, as at the cathedral, 
and before the basilica of St. John the Baptist, stand vast sar- 
cophaguses, in which great personages were buried, before it was 
permitted to entomb any one within the church. 



ri 



78 god's acre. 

round about thd church at first, the evil of intra- 
mural interment in its normal state having been, not 
interment within churches, but the erection of 
churches (Martyria, Propheteia, Apostolica) over the 
remains of honoured and venerated persons^ or by the 
translation of such remains from their original resting- 
place. 

For it had become usual to build churches either 
aroUnd the very grave of martyred persons, or very 
eminent saints ; or to build an orsktory or chapel, 
under their invocation, to which some relic of their 
bodies, or possibly a garment whidi had touched 
their tomb, was brought Scores of churches were 
built about the tombs of early saints and martyrs. 
Indeed, so general became this custom, that Euse- 
bius and other writers of that age use the term 
' martyrium' almost indiiSerently with that of 
church. 

And close, as close to these as the law would 
permit, as devotion could earn, as interest could 
achieve, did persons earnestly and emphatically seek 
interment Hence the zealous desire for interment 
in a church, the supposed holiness of the placa 

When the first wooden minster was raised in 
Thomey Island, this now royal city of Westminster 
was a swamp overgrown with briers ; but Sebert, the 
founder, placed within the humble walls precious 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 79 

relics which drew thither the devout of those days 
from distant parts of the country. 

When the monks removed the body of St. Cuth- 
bert from Lindisfam^ they built over it, in a thickly 
wooded hirsute wilderness, a little church of wands 
and branches, called afterwards Bough Church ; and 
lo ! now the lordly pile of Durham* 

In the days of Cenred, King of Mercia, a young 
man of high family and great military renown 
renounced the world, and lived a hermit's life, in a 
little wooden hut erected by himself, amid the fens 
and marshes of Lincolnshire. Here for ten years he 
abode 'in piety and painfulness' (to borrow Fuller's 
words), while the fame of his sanctity reached fcur and 
wide ; and here, over the very wattled hut where he 
lived, died, and was buried,^ arose in stately propor- 
tions, through the royal bounty of King Ethelred, a 
pupil of the hermit, the magnificent and far-famed 
Abbey of Oroyland. 

The church of St. Alban, in Hertfordshire, was 
built over the death-place of this, our first martyr ; 
and it was standing in the time of the Yenearable 
Bede, three hundred years after. 

The beautiful Cathedral of Canterbury owed its 

* It was very usual for hermits to be buried in the cells which 
their own hands had fashioned. The name of this recluse was 
Guthlac. 



8o god's acre. 

fame and magDificence entirely to the astute device 
of Cuthbert, the eleventh archbishop. He was a 
bold and successful innovator on the custom thereto- 
fore scrupulously observed of interring the deceased 
archbishops in St. Augustine's Monastery, and his 
device effected a marvellous change in the circum- 
stances of this church. 

This device was no other than causing himself to 
be interred within the walls of the cathedral. The 
superstitious reverence for shrines and relics was then 
great : crowds of devotees thronged to them, innu- 
merable offerings were made to them, and great 
wealth flowed in by these means on the fortunate 
possessors of relics, or of the bodies of persons eminent 
for sanctity. St Augustine's Monastery was rich in 
property of this description. He had himself, on its 
foundation, presented some valuable relics to it ; his 
own remains were interred there ; and round the 
high altar were arranged no fewer than fifteen (or 
seventeen) smaller altars or shrines, in which reposed 
the ashes of holy men of note. On these smaller 
altars it was customary to administer the private 
masses of the Church. Hence, possibly, might in 
some degree arise mistaken saint-worship. It is by 
no means improbable that ignorant, uneducated 
people, assembling round the shrine of a particular 
saint for devotion, might in mere ignorance transfer 



CHTJBCHES AND CHUBCHTABDS. 8 1 

to the saint whose name the altar bore that worship 
which belonged only to the Deity. The atrium of 
this monastery, oi* rather of the church of the 
Apostles Peter and Paul, had been from the earliest 
times the burial-place of the kings of Kent, and the 
archbishops and monks of Christ Chtireh, as well as 
of the people of the city of Canterbury. 

The Archbishop Cuthbert, jeiilous for the honour 
and prosperity of his own church, yet well aware that 
effectual malship of St. Augastine^s was OTily to be 
compassed by somQ escpiality of attraction, broke the 
spell which had so long enchained all hearts to that 
monastery. Having, on the occasion of receiving the 
pallium at Borne, obtained the pope's sanction that 
all future archbishc^ might be buried in the church 
of Canterbury, in a* cemetery whicb he piroposed to 
make there, he enlarged the cathedral church, and 
for the purpose of sepulture built a chapeLand porch, 
dedicated to St. John the Baptist Finding his end 
approaching, he gave especial directions, which were 
strictly obeyed, that he should be privately buried 
before his death was announced. This was done; 
but his purposes and preparations had not been so 
secretly carried on but that suspicion of his inten- 
tions got afloat; and scarcely had the deep bell 
announcing his death clanged out its dismal warning, 
ere the fraternity of St. Augustine's came in great 

G 



82 god's acre. 

numbers, and armed with weapons, to fight, if need 
were, for their prey. But their zeal was futile ; 
the archbishop was buried ; and so well had he 
taken his measures, and so well did the brotherhood 
of the cathedral (feeling their own interest therein) 
second his intentions, that the disappointed Augus- 
tinians were totally unable to discover the tomb. 

This stratagem altered the tide of affairs : other 
archbishops followed Cuthbert's example, and in 
after days the interment here of the murdered 
Becket completed the supremacy of the cathedral 
over its theretofore more prosperous neighbour^ St 
Augustine's Abbey. 

Veneration for the graves of esteemed churchmen, 
and more especially for the relics gradually accumu- 
lated in churches, brought devotees from all parts of 
the world, and tombs were soon crowded around the 
' holy earth.' 



CHAPTER IV. 



INTERMENT. 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS — continued. 



T?ROM the first ages of Christianity the desire to 
be buried in holy earth has been great ; nor has 
this craving been by any means confined to Christians. 
Who is not aware of the earnest and pious zeal of the 
Hindoo to be borne to the banks of his holy river, 
the Ganges, to die ; or of the earnest care with which 
the Moslem of the distant cities, when he feels his 
last hour to be come, turns himself in the direction of 
Mecca — his Ganges — hia Jerusalem? 

It is the same feeling which causes the wealthy 
Jew to import from the Holy Land soil wherewith to 
line his coffin ; but numbers of Jews who have not 
wealth, and who must undergo all the toil and priva- 
tion which even in these days accompany a poor 
man's journey, are continually arriving at Jerusalem 
to sleep their last long sleep in the sepulchres of 
their fathers of old. 

On the same principle the Campo Santa at Pisa 
was filled with earth from the Holy Land, brought 
in the ships of the Fisan Crusaders. 

Q 2 



84 god's acbe. 

On the same principle, corrupted, accrued the 
great error of supposing morsels of clay, taken from 
the grave of a holy man, to be a preservative against 
disease. 

In one of the works of the holy Christian fathers 
now laid open to the unlearned reader, there is a 
most interesting account of the * motherly and pious 
aflfection' with which a bereaved parent, * Flora,' 
desires- that h^ lost son should be buried at the 
memorial of some saint. Her wish was gratified, 
•for he was buried in the basilica of Felix the Con- 
fessor ; and in consequence of her anxiety to know 
whether such burial profit a man after death, St 
Augustine wrote the treatise On Gave to he had for 
the Dead, which has been a reference and standard 
authority ever since. On the especial point above 
referred to, he Bays- 

Mliat a person is buried at the memorials of the 
martyrs, this, I think, so far profits the departed, 

^ The only reason why the name memorials, or monuments, is 
given to those sepulchres of the dead which became speedily dis- 
tinguished is, that they recall to memory, and by putting in 
mind cause us to think of, them who by death are withdrawn 
from the eyes of the living, that they may not by forgetMness 
be also withdrawn from men's hearts. For both the term 
memorial most plainly shows this, and monument is so named 
from monishing — that is, putting in mind.— St. Attovstike 
(Oxford transUUion)* 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 85 

that, while commending him also to the martyr's 
patronage, the affection of supplication on his behalf 
is increased.' 

A further quotation from the same treatise will not 
be displaced here : — 

^ So then, aU. these things, care of funeral, bestowal, 
in sepulture, pomp of obsequies, are more for comfort 
of the living than for help to the dead. If it at all 
profit the ungodly to have costly sepulture, it shall, 
harm the godly to have vile sepulture or none. 
Right handsome obsequies in sight of men did that 
rich man who was clad in purple receive of the crowd 
of his housefolk ; but far more handsome did that 
poor man who was full of sores obtain of the ministry 
of angels, who bore him not out into a marble tomb, 
but into Abraham's bosom bore him on high, 

' Tet it follows not that the bodies of the departed 
are to be despised and flung aside, and above all of 
just and faithful men, which bodies as organs and 
vessels to all good works their spirit hath holily used. 
For if a father's garment and ring, and whatever 
such like, is the more dear to those whom they leave 
behind, the greater their affection is towards their 
parents, in no wise are the bodies themselves to be 
spumed, which truly we wear in more familiar and 
dose conjunction than any of our putting on«^ For 
these pertain not to ornament or aid which is applied 



86 god's acre. 

from without ; but to the very nature of man. 
Whence also the funerals of the just men of old were 
with dutiful piety cared for, and their obsequies cele- 
brated, and sepulture provided ; and themselves 
while living did, touching burial or even translation 
of their bodies, give charge to their sons.' 

There are striking instances of the existence of this 
feeling in modem times. Few persons would in 
choice be the first buried in a new churchyard, and 
for this reason, possibly, the cemetery of St George's, 
Queen-square, remained nearly if not entirely empty 
until the ground was broken to receive the remains 
of Mr. Nelson, the honoured author of The Fasts 
and Festivals of the Church, Then other inter- 
ments followed quickly. 

But an instance strong as that of any saint or 
martyr of old is given us in the tomb of John 
Bunyan, the author of the Pilgrim's Progress, in 
Bunhill-fields. So numerous have been and still are 
* the dying requests of his idolaters to be buried as 
near as possible to the place of his interment, that 
it is not now possible to obtain a grave near him, the 
whole surrounding earth being entirely preoccupied 
by dead bodies to a very considerable distance.' 

In an old Spanish law the following reasons are 
given for burying in churchyards : — 

I. Because the persons were Christians. 



CHUECHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 87 

2. Because they are in sight of their relations and 
«»d. .ho ^ ^y f» .hi. 

3. Because the patrons of the Church may do the 
same. 

4. Because the devil has no power over them. 

Evil spirits were supposed to be powerless in con- 
secrated ground, and hence perhaps the beautiful 
old term 'God's Acre/ as applied to churchyards. 

They were considered very sacred.^ Durand 
indeed tells us that any spot is holy in which the 
body, or even only the head of a Christian is buried ; 
not that, however, which contains the body without 
the head. 

In consecrated churchyards no self-murderer,^ nor 

^ In the time of Constantine, a woman was allowed to divorce 
her husband for any one of three crimes : if he was a murderer, 
or a sorcerer, or a robber of graves, 

' A tradesman on the Galloway coast, whose wife had com- 
mitted suicide, not daring to place her remains in consecrated 
ground, buried them close outside the churchyard wall ; but, to 
his horror, found the next morning that the coffin had been dis- 
interred, and reared against his own house. By the advice of a 
gentleman whom he consulted, he remained perfectly quiet until 
night, when, favoured by darkness, he, unobserved, placed the 
coffin on the sea-shore, within flood-mark. The morning's tide 
covered the coffin with sand, and obliterated all marks of the grave. 

We are told that the infuriated populace spent the next day in 
a vain search for it ; for formerly there was no brutality too 
brutal, no indignity too degrading, to be lavished on the corpse 
of a suicide. 



88 god's acbe. 

adulterer, nor, perjured person, not even a heretic or 
a jew (Si vero infiddeSy ao hceretid, vd perfidi 
Judm) was allowed to be buried in consecrated 
ground. These strict laws became somewhat modi- 
fied; but probably from this original dates the 
superstition, to which I have referred elsewhere, of 
horror and disgust of the north side of the church- 
yard ; because as the rigour of the law was evaded, 
this was the portion usually appropriated to unbap- 
tized children, condemned persons, etcetera^ 

A very sad and serious outcry has arisen of late 

^ By the Eoman law, those stricken by lightning were interred 
wherever they fell. 

Dorand gives the following customs of our own country :— 

A man killed in a siege might be buried wherever he could 
be so. 

A merchant or foreigner who died at sea was to be carried to 
the nearest land ; or if this could not be done, enclosed in a 
wooden shell and thrown into the sea. 

None but Christians should be buried in a Christian burying- 
ground ; and even if they profess the faith, not such as have been 
killed in adultery or robbery ; or in worldly sports, unless at a 
tournament. 

So that, if a dead body is found, it should be buried on the 
same spot on which it lies, because the occasion of its death is 
doubtM. 

No one killed in a duel or a sudden broil, unconfessed, and no 
suicide, can obtain Christian burial. 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 89 

agaiilst churchyards in crowded towns and cities This 
outcry was excited by a very peremptory necessity, and 
cannot be too earnestly persevered in. As a mattiBr 
of feeling, too, nothing can be more loathsome and 
disgusting than many of these sweltering graveyards. 

To consecrate each grave within its walls. 
And breathe a benison o'er the sleeping dost, 

was the original purport of this * field and acre of our 
God ;' now, in many, desecration and irreverence are 
paramount, and the very bones of those piously in- 
terred, in hope of peaceful repose until the day of 
resurrection, are scattered round in careless and 
unregarded neglect. 

This long-lasting outrage has at last attracted just 
rebuke, and is being altered. 

But this applies only to overthronged city grave- 
yards, and by no means universally to them. In the 
country, where crowds have not so congregated, there 
yet remain hundreds of churchyards untinged by 

Even such as fall in batitle, thongh entitled to ecclesiastical 
rites, must not be carried into a church, lest the pavement be 
polluted with blood. 

For the same reason, even women dying in childbed were 
similarly excluded. 

No one killed while engaged in an illicit amour may repose in 
the oommon cemeteary^^^JScUumale, cap. v. p. 15. Ed. 1609. 
Venice. 



90 god's acbe. 

that desecration which seems almost inevitably to 
attach to them in a bustling town, especially 
where they are, as so many are, miguarded thorough- 
fares 

And there is something which always deeply in- 
terests iu a secluded, undesecrated, country church- 
yard. There are few who like not to linger among the 
rustic graves, and read their homely epitaphs. The 
sweet aspect of the country, and the pure breath of 
the unpolluted air, take from it that repulsion which 
not infrequently appertains to the crowded cemetery 
of the city ; and the repose and the quiet around steal 
with a soothing and sofbeniDg influence on the mind, 
and dispose it towards those purifying reflections 
which, amid the bustle and turmoil of life, are found 
to arise all too seldom for beneficial results to accrue. 
A sojourn in a country churchyard is a homily of 
powerful argument on the uncertainty of life, and of 
the sure approach of the all-potent destroyer,. Death. 

But nature herself so provides that irreverence to 
the dead is the eocception to the usual rule, to the 
all but universal usage of humanity. The sanctity 
of death may be occasionally, nay frequently, violated, 
but can never generally be forgotten. Whether cul- 
tivated or savage, almost every people has considered 
the violation of a burjing-place a sort of sacrilege. 

And it is owing probably to this deep-seated and 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 9 1 

universal reverence for places of burial, that even in 
our Christian sera it was not thought requisite, for 
some ages, specially to consecrate them. (See infra^ 

P- 94.) 

I have before stated from Durandus, that any 

spot where interment had taken place was considered 
holy. The holiness of a burial-place is almost every- 
where allowed. Even amongst the savage New Zea- 
landers, a place of interment is tapu, or sacred. The 
wild and warlike Afghauns have a great reverence for 
burying-grounds, which they caU by the expressive 
phrase, '• cities of the silent.' 

It is probable that the discontent which led to the 
great insurrection of the natives against the Dutch 
rule in the island of Java, in 1825, and which ex- 
tended over an area of above seven hundred square 
miles, might have brooded and slumbered on without 
breaking into actual insubordination and hostility, if 
the Dutch resident at the Court of Mataram had not 
destroyed a tomb within the premises of one of the 
Javan princes, which interfered with the construction 
of certain new roads. 

Amongst the Turks great reverence is paid to the 
resting-places of the dead, and nowhere perhaps are 
they so beautiful. Their great and increasing size is 
owing to the repugnance of this people even to dis- 
turb the soil where a body has been laid. They 



g% QOD S ACBE. 

always seek a new and virgin spot, and would recoil 
with horror from the sight of the dismembered relics 
so often disturbed by our grave-diggers. 

The Chinese and the inhabitants of the Sunda 
Islands seem to vie with each other in the reverence 
with which they consider the burial-places of their 
ancestors, for which they select retired and pic- 
turesque sites. A very considerable portion of the 
land in the vicinity of Shanghae is occupied by the 
tombs of the dead, which are overgrown with long 
gra^, or flowers simple in their kind. No expensive 
ones are used for this purpose. In autumn they are 
often almost carpeted with a mass of brilUant purple 
flowers, a species of Lycoria, A traveller speaks of 
the Anerrione Japonica as in full flower amongst 
the graves round the ramparta It blooms, he adds, 
in November, when the flowers have gone by, and is 
niost appropriate to the resting-places of the dead. 

The Moors of Africa, on the borders of the Great 
Desert^ are accustomed to plant one particular shrub 
over graves, and no stranger is allowed to pluck a 
leaf or even to touch it, so great a veneration have 
they for the deadi 

To return to our own country. 

Sir Hans Sloane, who was made a baronet on the 
accession of George I., and who was the flrst English 
physician so elevated, gave to Chelsea parish the 



CHCJRCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 93 

burying-ground in the King's-road. It was not ori- 
ginally his intention to make this donation, but, it is 
said, that on the ground being opened for some other 
pm:pose, the foundation of a chapel and some human 
bones were discovered, and the celebrated physician, 
supposing the place to have been consecrated, reve- 
renced it,-^ and bestowed it appropriately. 

Therefore it is very reasonable to suppose that so 



I T^ P ■ > ■ 



^ Dr. Layard gives u&r a marked illustration of how this 
accustomed respect and reverence may yield to expediency or 
political jealousy. 

His labours at Nineveh were prohibited, and he waited on the 
Pasha at Mosul to learn the reason. The Pasha said — 

* It was with deep regret I learnt after your departure yester- 
day, that the mound in which you are digging had been used as 
a burial-ground by Mussulmans, and was covered with their 
graves. Now you are aware that, by the law, it is forbidden to 
disturb a tomb; and the cadi and mufti have already made 
representations to me on the subject.' 

Possibly French jealousy had induced this prohibition; for, 
continues Dr. Layard, 'Daoud Agha* confessed to me on our 
way that he had received orders to 7nahe graves on the mound, 
and that his troops had been employed for two nights in bringing 
stones firom distant villages for that purpose. 'We have de- 
stroyed more real tombs of true believers/ said he, ' in making 
sham ones, than you could have defiled between the Zab and 
Selamiyah. We have killed our horses and ourselves in carrying 
those accursed stones.' ' 

* A captain of the irregular troops, whose services were en- 
gaged by Dr. Layard. 



94 ood's acbe. ] 

early as the Christian might be permitted openly 'to 
bury his dead/ instead of resorting by stealth and in 
darkness to ' dens and caves of the earth/ so soon 
would he hallow by a specific benediction the spot 
where, in prayer and in hope, the seed for the Al- 
mighty's eternal harvest was sown. But though so 
probably, it might hardly be too much to say so cer- 
tainly customary, there is not any express mention 
of the consecration of cemeteries until the sixth 
century. Subsequently the rite is often mentioned. 
In the note^ is one of the earliest forms of conse- 



^ De Benedictione Cimiterii. 
Cum ecclesia olim solebat benedici et cimiteriam, igitor oper» 
pretium est, ut postquam ea quae pertment ad ecdesiffi benedic- 
tionem disseruimus, nonnullos antiquos ordines ad benedicendum 
cimiterium proferamus. 

Ordol. 

Ex. MS. Pontificali Egberd Eboraoensis ArchiepiscopL 

In Consecratione Cimiterii. 

Primitus cum aqud henedictA episcopus cum clericis suis 

circumdare debet omne cimiterium cum jpsahno Miserere mihi 

Deus, et AntiphonA Asperges me. JPostea Litania demde 

dicat : Dominus vobiscam. 

In Onentali angulo cimiterii, Deus qui es totius orbis con- 
ditor, et humani generis redemptor, &c. 

In australi angulo cimiterii, Domine Sancte, Pater omni- 
potens, trina m^jestas, &c. 

Item in ocddentali angulo cimiterii, Domine Deus, pastor 
setemsB glorise, &c 



CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 95 

oration, selected merely as being the shortest These 
forms differ materially from one another ; but in all, 
psalms are sung in procession round the cemetery, 
* and prayers are usually offered on the north, south, 
east, and west sides thereof. In England the 49th 
and 114th Psalms are (or were) sung, these being suc- 
ceeded by appropriate collects. 

One especial circumstance attending the consecra- 
tion of a churchyard in earlier days, was the erection 
of a cross in the centre. To this custom more par- 
ticular reference is made hereafter. 

The care of the Church for her children in old 
time was imceasing and minutely observant, and the 
Anglo-Saxon laws were so thoroughly imbued with 
the impress of religion, that it has been found most 
difficult to separate the ecclesiastical from the secular 
enactments. The union of Church and State was 
close and immediate, and the care of religion was an 
intrinsic part of the national laws.^ 



In ctquilonari angulo cimiterii, Omnipotens Dominus qui es 
costos animarum, &c. 

Oratio in medio poliandri. 

Adesto qnflBsnmos, Domine, officio servitutis, Ac — Mariene 
de Ants, JSccle. Ititibus. 

^ The Witena-gemot, being solicited to chastise such as despised 
the observance of Lent, or such as neglected to baptize their 



96 god's acre. 

From these laws it appears that appeals to Borne 
formed no portion of the ancient discipline of our 
Church. These references did in fact grow and in- 
crease almost imperceptibly-^as abuses do ; perhaps 
Originating in the' vexed appeal of an injured or dis- 
appointed ecclesiastic. They came indeed .to be con- 
sidered as an intrinsic part of Cluirch government, 
but had no original oonnexiosi with it whatsoever. 
It was the churchmen of the twelfth and succeeding 
centuries who promulged and cherished high notions 
of the nature of the Church as a worldly kingdom, 
of which the Bishop of Bome was supreme head. 
The change gradually made in the practice of our 
Anglo-Saxon courts was the giving to bishops, who 
were likewise secular barons, the right to decide 
causes of religion in courts where none but ecclesi- 
astics presided; so that by degrees it became an 
established fact that the laity were totally excluded 

children, soon considered ecclesiastical penalties as much its 
province as those incurred by a violation of civil law. Thus, by 
the laws of the Saxon states, if a man neglected to baptize within 
the first month, he paid a fine of thirty shillings. If the child 
died after that period without the regenerating rite, his whole 
property was forfeited, to be employed for the relief of the poor, 
and other holy works. In fine, there was scarcely a command- 
ment in the Decalogue, the violation of which did not fall within 
the cognisance of the civil tribunals, so blended were they with 
the eodesiastioal.— Jfor. Cath., book viii. c. 6. 



CHURCHES AND CHUBCHYARDS, 97 

from any participation in the legislating of Church 
matters. 

The foregoing remarks are in part derived from 
Archdeacon Hale's prelude to *A Series of Pre^ 
cedents cmd Proceedi/ngs illustrative of the Die-- 
dpU/ne of the Church of Englcmd/ extracted from 
ancient books of ecclesiastical courts. 

Mr. Hale says that he felt disappointment at dia* 
covering the comparatively trivial nature of the 
offences for which persons were brought to account 
before the ecclesiastical courts ; but the work shows^ 
he adds, how men ordinarily offended against religion, 
exhibiting ' the faults of daily life so accurately and 
minutely, that it would almost seem as if there was 
no act or word, contrary to truth or purity, for which 
he who committed it might not be called to account.' 
It is indeed a sort of history of the moral police of 
the ChurcL 

The following extracts are selected from this pubK- 
cation as being curious to our present experience, and 
some of them not altogether irrelevant here. 

The last quoted of these precedents affords a very 
graphic iUustration of maaners two centuries aga. 
We learn that it gave * great offence to many ' that a 
daughter should sit in her mother's pew at church. 
The ^ young maydea' of modem days are educated 
rather to take precedence of their mothers, than to 

H 



98 god's acbe. 

wait reverently at the pew-door. Certainly parents 
are at discount in modem society. The 'happy 
medium' in the practical exposition of the fifth com- 
mandment, as in everything else, seems not less 
difficult of attainment than the philosopher's stone.^ 
What would have been the outciy amongst the old 
women of the last century if any Dame school had 
been thus interfered with I 

* Essex, 1519* 
* Conira RicharduTa Dames et ejus uxorem, 

de Ba/rking. 

* Notatur, that his said wife techeth a skole and not 
lycensed. Comparuit Bichardus Dawes maritus^ et 
fassus est, that his wife teacheth some women and 
some men children to reade. TJnde Dominus accep- 
tavit (confessionem) et monuit quod imposterum 
abstineat ; that (s)he shall not teache any man child 
above the age of x yeres, untyll she shall be law- 
fully licensed, et eum dimisit' 

* 1540. Proceedings in the court of the Archdeaconry 

^ f Till the close of the last century » the buckram of English 
costome extending its influence to our domestio habits, children 
were kept at arm's length by their parents, and grown-up sons 
and daughters treated as children. But from this fierce extreme 
we have rushed into another. Armour of steel has been ex- 
changed for the loosest deshabille, till the rising generation 
became the legislators of the hour.' 



CHUKCHES AND CHURCHYABDS. 99 

of Colchester Colne Wake. Notatur per icoiiimos 
dicte ecclesie y^ the parson mysusithe the churohe- 
yard, for hogis do wrote up graves, and besse (cattle) 
lie in the porche, and ther the pavements be broke 
up and soyle the porche ; and ther is so mych oatell 
y^ usithe the churchyarde, y^ is more liker a pasture 
than a halowed place ; moreover he is note able to 
kepe the cure, for ther be divers y* hathe died w'oute 
howsiU or shrifte throwe his defaute, for he is slake 
and slow/ 

'Ardeby Item we do present that our 

churcheyarde is in decay, by the vicar and the parson, 
})ecause that the vicar doythe latt the churcheyarde 
to them that usythe it wytjie vile bestes.' 

About the same period a certain vicar is * sworn to 
penance,' for putting a horse in the churchyard. 

A few years later, the rector of Langdon Hill was 
summoned for allowing sheep to be folded in the 
church ; and though he proved that during a heavy 
and unexpected fall of snow they were placed there 
as the only means of saving their lives, that they 
were there two days ' first and last, being worhi/nge 
dayea ; and then by greate labor and paynes his ser- 
vantes, when the fall of snowe was ended, theie put 
them into another place, and made clone the church: 

Ha 



loo god's acbe. 

all whicii was done for grde amd extreme neceaaitie 
saJce, and not in anie contempte / the archdeacon 
accepted the confession of the rector, but appointed 
him a certain penance, and to distribute alms amongst 
the poor of the parish. 

How should we in these days relish such scrutiny 
$is the following ? 

* Curia tenta apud Baddowe, v** Decembris, 1566. 

' Contra Thorriam Arter^ de BadcUnve Magncu 

* Because he will geve but obolum pauperibua 
Comparuit dictus Arter, et objecto articulo, he saithe 
that he is not of the wealthe that men takithe him 
to ba XJnde Dominus assignavit eum solvere obolum 
every wicke, et sic dimisit.' 

And again : — > 

'1583. 
' Contra Bamardum Gla/rke, pa/rochie de 

Haverstoke. 

* Detected for being an uncharitable person, and 
for not gevenge to the poore and impotent, and for 
not receavinge the communion sithence the firste 
daie of January. Comparuit et negavit, that he is 
m uncharitable person. Dominus ei injunxit ad 
purgandum in proximo, 4^ manu.' 

Excommunication does not seem to have been a 



CHtmCHES AND CHUBCHYARDS. 10 r 

mere form in our Church even after the Reformation 
was established 

* In the P. C. A., Essex, 1590. 

•Edmund Wyland of Chipping Ongar, being under 
sentence of excommunication, persisted in remaining 
in church during evening prayer/ The result was, 
that the minister was constrained to cease the 
service. 

'A similar case occurred at Dudinghurst in the 
same archdeaconry in 1605 : the minister quitted 
the church until the excommunicant could be pre- 
vailed upon by others to retire. 

Such citations as the following may show us that 

the inquisition into Dame schools recorded above was 

not unnecessary* 

' 1583. 

* Contra Joharmem White, de Woodha/m 

Mortymer. 
^Detected, for that he is clerke of the churche 
and cannot read. Dominus dimisit' 

* Essex, July 2, igpj^. 

* JJo&crfum Hanger y de Waltham Stowe. 

< Detected, for that he cometh very seldom to 
church, and is indebted to the parishe, for ringing of 
a knell, at the death of his son, xvi^.; which he 
obstinately refuseth to pay, contrary to order and 
custom Dominus monuit eum ad solvendum/ 



io2 god's acre. ^ 

*i6i8. Proceedings in the court of the Arch- 
deacomy of Essex. 

* Eastwood, contra Richardum Downha/nu ) 

^ Fresentatur, for sleeping in church .... Allegavit,^ 
that he did not sleepe in the church this twelve- 
month. TJnde Domiuus habita monitione eum 
dimisit.' 

Mr. Hale gives several citations for neglect of the 
usual ceremonies in interment, as also for burial out 
of the parish. One is here transcribed. It occurred 
in Essex in 1593. 

* Magistrum Bainbriggy Ministrum de Nortcm 

Mcmsfidd. 

'Detected, for burieing the dead corps of one 
Father Cooke not saing servyce in manner and form 
as it is in the book of Common Prayer prescribed. 
.... Fassus est, .that he did not goe to the grave 
according to the booke of Common Prayer, by 
reason of a greate winde, and he not being well durst 
not goe into the danger of taking cold in the ayre ; 
but he saith that he redd the whole servyce, accotd* 
ing to the booke of Common Prayer. Undo Dominiis 
injunxit ei, that on Sunday next he shall acknowledge 
that he hathe omitted his dewty, in not burieing the 
dead according to the order prescribed.' 




CHURCHES AND CHURCHYARDS. 



103 



I conclude these extracts with a bon bouche for the 
mothers and daughters of the present day. 

' 1617. 
* Bumha/m, conira Saywa/rd, pueUa/m. 

'Fresentatur, for that she being but a yonge 
mayde, sat in the pewe with het mother, to the great 
offence of many reverent women : howbeit that after 
I, Peter Lewis, the vicar, had in the church privatHe 
admonished the said yonge mayde of her fault, 
and advised her to sitt at her mother's pewe-dore, 
she obeyed; but nowe'sbe sitts againe with her 
mother,' 



CHAPTER V. 

INTEBMENT. 
CEBIETEBIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. 

' Earth to earth, and dust to dust !' 
Here the evil and the just. 
Here the yoathM and the old. 
Here the fearful and the bold. 
Here the matron and the nudd. 
In one talent bed are laid ; 
Here the yassal and the king 
Side by side lie withering ; 
Here the sword and sceptre rust — 
'Earth to earth, and dust to dust!' 

TN «.e burial regiHters of the parish church at 
-L Clifton, near Bristol, are various entries referring 
to interments in *THE Quality Vault/ Amongst 
these, in the last century, occurs the name of the Lady 
Harriott Fitzgerald, daughter of Lord Kildare. And 
there is also a register, about the same period, of the 
burial of Miss Harriott Halds, ' in the Quality Vault/ 
It is to be hoped that no plebeian dust may by 
any mismanagement have found its way into this 
aristocratic receptacle. But such notifications form 
a curious commentary on the remark which Southey 
relates to have been made by John Wesley, on the 



CEMETERIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES* loj 

occasion of his preaching at this church, and seeing 
many rich people assembled. 

* My heart/ says he, * was much pained for them, 
^nd I was earnestly desirous that some, even of them, 
might enter into the kingdom of Heaven.^ 

When this * quality vault' was constructed the pre- 
sent usage of suburban cemeteries was not in vogue ; 
indeed, the crying necessity had not existed which has 
been the main cause of their formation, though fashion 
may have done somewhat. But it is a strange fashion, 
a strange fancy, which can-induce persons to prefer to 
be laid in a gay lounge, the feet of careless, frivolous, 
and thoughtless promenaders and pleasure-seekers 
all but treading on your grave, rather than to lie in 
the holy quiet of a churchyard. For though many 
churchyards be now of propriety and necessity closed, 
there are others yet open for those who earnestly 
wish them. But numbers, as we have said, who have 
power to gratify their own fancies, prefer these arti« 
ficial, and comparatively unhallowed places. 

It may be a fancy, but surely it is akin both to 
nature and reason, that the environs of the places 
solemnly dedicated ages ago to Gbd's worship, hal- 
lowed by the prayers of succeeding generations for 
centuries past, where the air is redolent with the 
breath of prayer ofiFered up by pious Christians now 
sleeping the sleep of the righteous below ; where per- 



Xo6 QOi/8 JLC&k 

Qhance we ourselves were admitted into the Holy' 
CommuDion of Christ's flock, and where we have 
seen probably some of those nearest and dearest to us 
laid in . their last narrow house ; where, it may be, 
their spirits are still hovering around ; — surely it is 
most natural, most reasonable, most pious, that there 
we should wish to repose too. 

For it is difiScult to understand the feelings of 
indi^erence with which some, sincerely good people 
too, declaim on the worthlessness of the body, and 
their carelessness of what becomes of it. * What 
matters/ say they, Hhisold vile garment, these rags f 
Oh much, very much. For are we not told that it 
shall rise again ? This contemptuous indifference is 
very far removed from a Christian repudiation x>{ 
pomp and finery. Sir Lewis Clifford, who died in 
the beginning of the fifteenth century, when fimereal 
pomp and ostentation w^re more than ever rife, 
ordered by his will * y* on his careyne be nether laid 
cloth of golde ne of sylke ; but a blate cloth ; and a 
taper at his head, and another at his feet ; ne stone, 
ne other thing, wherby eny man may witt where my • 
careyne leyeth.' 

No want of ceremony and observance here ;; no 
token of contemptuous indifference ; merely a repu- 
diation of pomp and luxury. No cloth of gold or 
silk, but a decent and solemn black cloth, and a' 



CEIMETERIES 'AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. 10 f 

Ughted taper, meet' emblem of renewed life, placed 
head and foot; and no pompous ornament to dis- 
tinguish him from his brother man in the tomb. 

Of this Christian humility as to external pomp and 
parade we have given several more recent illustrations 
(p. 6^) ; but this is a very diflferent matter from in- 
difference or carelessness as to the treatment of this 
* mortal coil' Persons who are indifferent as to the 
usage of their mortal remains, contemptuous as to its 
present destination, or callous as to its surgical dis- 
memberment, must surely quite forget St. Paul's sub- 
lime exposition of the doctrine of the resurrection of 
the body. Such indifference is at least more philo* 
sophical than natural or religious. 

For they are not dead. No, oh no. We are sure 
of that. The calm, silent, (how silent !) lifeless frame 
on which we look shall surely rise again, 'clothed 
and in his right mind/ Clothed with immortality, 
robed in inexpressive beauty, fraught with an angel's 
mind. Yes, this body — ^waiting, sleeping, changed-r- 
this human chrysalis shall waken, and soar on radiant 
wing to that empyrean whence its immortal spirit 
first dmanated.^ 

^ * All mankind shall rise at the day of doom, from death to 
life, in body and soul together, each in his own kind and in his 
6wn body, incorruptible and immortal. And though the body 
were burned with fire, and the powder thereof thrown into the 



io8 god's ACBBL 

I 

The following are the beaatiful and most truthful 
lines of a now almost forgotten poet : — 

E'en the lag flesh 
Bests, too, in hope of meeting once again 
Its better half, never to sunder more— 
Nor shall it hope in vain : the time draws on 
When not a single spot of burial-earUi, 
Whether on land or in the spacious sea. 
But must give back its long-committed dust 
Inviolate : and faithfully shall these 
Make up the full account ; not the least atom 
Embezzled, or mislaid, of the whole tale ! 
Each soul shall have a body ready fumish'd ; 

And each shall have his own. 

• • • ' • • 

When the dread trumpet sounds, the slumb'ring dust. 
Not unattentive to the call, shall wake ; 
And every joint possess its proper place. 
With a new elegance of form, unknown 
To its first state. 

Far more consonant with the best feelings of our 
nature is the impulse which causes parents to lay 
their lost children in one grave ; or children to im- 
plore to be interred with their departed parents ; or 
the unforgetting widow to pray that she may be 
carried to the grave of her husband buried fifty years 

— — - - - - — ■ _ ■ - . ■ — 

four seas that go about the world, yet the soul and it shall come 
together again, and rise from death to life at the dreadful doom 
and from that day forward never after depart.' — Db. John 

WiCKXIFF. 



CEMETEBIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. I09 

* 

before, and far away from the spot where destiny had 
fixed her in later life. This we have seen, and have 
seen the wish appreciated and respected, and ful- 
filled by survivors, to their own painful inconve- 
nience. 

The observation of the celebrated Edmund Burke, 
on his first visit to Westminster Abbey, has been 
recorded : — 

^I would rather sleep in the southern corner of 
a country churchyard, than in the tomb of the 
Capulet& I should like, however, that my dust should 
mingle with kindred dust ; the good old expression, 
^ family burying-ground,' has something pleasing in 
it, at least to me.* 

When in earlier times it was forbidden to inter 
two bodies in one grave, exception was always made 
in the case of husband and wife— the most touching 
and most reverent acknowledgment of the sanctity 
of the marriage tie that it is possible to conceive.^ 

How many have been the instances where persons 
have quietly, unostentatiously, unknovm indeed to 
ihose most domesticated with them, denied them- 
selves day by day, for years, some little accustomed 
delicacy or refinement, in order to accumulate sufii-^ 
dent money to cany them where they wished, to be 



^ 2)tfra»(^, book y. 



no god's acbe. 

buried * with their own people/ without inoonyenience 
to their surviyors. Can there be a more touching 
illustration than that given by the beautiful Lady 
Murray, in her naemoir of hex mother, Lady Qrisell 
Baillie — a lady who presents so bright an exemplar 
in Qvery social relation, as daughter, wife, parent, 
and friend ? We will quote Lady Murray's simply 
narrative in her own words :— 

^One might a little judge of what esteem she was 
in with all that knew Ixer, from the letters we re- 
ceived from all quarters, and the loss many had in 
losing her, not only as a friend, but benefactor. She 
had been ill of a cold that was epidemical, but was 
down-stairs the week before she died ; was confined 
to her bed but a few days, and had her senses entire 
to the last. Two days before she died we were all in 
the room. She said, ' My dears, read the last chapter 
of the Proverbs ; you know what it is.' To have her 
grandsons happily married lay near her heart, and I 
imagine it was with regard to that, she said it I 
think it a very strong picture of herself; and if ever 
any deserved to have it said of them, she does. The 
next day she called me ; gave directions about some 
few things ; said she wished to be carried home to li^ 
by my father , but that perhaps it would be too much 
trouble and inconvenience to us at that season, there- 
fore left me to do as I pleased ; but that, in a black 



CEMETEBIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. Ill 

jpurse in her cabinet, I would find money sufficient to 
do it, which sh^ had kept by her for that use, that 
whenever it happened, it might not straiten u& She 
added, * I have now no more to say or do ;' tenderly 
embraced me, and laid down her head upon the 
pillow, and spoke little after that.' ^ 
„ We have Scripture testimony to show that this 
solicitude about a buiying-place is not only natural, 
but pious and holy. 

On the death of the patriarch Jacob, hia most 
flearly loved son Joseph thus spoke to Pharaoh : — 

' My father made me swear, saying, Lo, I die : in 
my grave which I have digged for me in the land of 
Canaan^ there shalt thou bury ma Now therefore 
let me go up, I pray thee, and bury my father, and I 
will come again. 

* And Pharaoh said, Oo up, and bury thy father, 
according as he made thee swear. 

'And Joseph went up to bury his father ; and with 
him went aU the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of 
his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt. 

^ Sir John Throckmortonj of Coughton, Warwickshire, died 
April 13, 1445. He bequeathed his body to be buried in the 
parish- ohorch of St. John B^tist, at Fladbniy; app(Nnting 
that his executors should provide a marble stone of such large- 
ness, that it might cover the graves of his brother, mother, and 
his own, with his wife's, in case she should determine to be there 
baried. 



112 god's ACBE. 

^ And all the house of Joseph, and his brethren, 
and his father's house : only their little ones, and 
their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of 
Goshen. 

^ And there went up with him both chariots and 
horsemen : and it was a very great company. 

^ And his sons did unto him according as he com* 
manded them ; 

'For his sons carried him into the land of Canaan, 
and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah, 
which Abraham bought with the field for a possession 
of a burying-place/ 

According to the solemn injunction of the dying 
patriarch, the last breath that lingered on his {iGdter<» 
inglips — 

' I am to be gathered unto my people : bury me 
with my fathers f in the cave that is in the field of 
Ephron the Hittite. 

' In the cave that is in Machpelah, which is before 
Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham 
bought with the field of Ephron the Hittite, for a 
possession of a buiying-place. 

' There they buried Abraham, and Sarah his wife ; 
there they buried Isaac, and Bebekah his wife ; and 
there I buried Leah/ 

Thus, as we learn, did the venerable patriarch 
recur with his last breath to his dearest and holiest 



CEMETERIES/AND CHAENEL-HOUSES. JIJ 

connexions, his father, his grandfather^ and his tried 
and faithful wife, and ordain that his bones. should 
be laid by theirs. The ashes of his beautiful and 
most dearly beloved wife reposed far away * on the 
way to Ephrath, and Jacob set a pillar upon her 
grave/ ^ But perhaps, could the spirit of Leah h^ve 
been prescient, her trials and long-suffering would 
have been recompensed by the knowledge that her 
body would be laid in the tomb of her husban'd's 
honoured ancestors, and that his ashes would rest 
beside hers. 

And when Joseph found his last hour at hand, he 
said, * I die : and God will surely visit you, and bring 
you out of this land unto the land which he sware to 
Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. 

^ And Joseph took an oath of the children of 
Igrael, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall 
carry up my bones from hence,' 

And they did so, under the conduct of Moses, at 
the Exodus. 

And in that oft-quoted and beautiful history of 
Ruth, she says to Naomi — 

* Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from 
following after thee ; for whither thou goest, I will 
go ; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge ; thy people 
ehall be my people, and thy God my God : 

' And to this day a pillar marks the spot 

I 



J 14 GODS ACBE. 

^ Where thou diest^ I will die ; and there will I be 
buried.' 

And because the prophet at Bethel^ as we are told 
in the first book of Kings^ disr^arded the command 
of God, it was decreed to him by the Most High, as 
a part of his punishment, that 'his carcase should 
not come unto the sepulchre of his fEithers/ 

The aged Tobit also thus conjures his son : — 

< My son, when I am dead, bury me ; and despise 
not thy mother, but honour her all the days of thy 
life .... and when she is dead, bury her by me in 
one grave. 

* And he buried him honourably ; and when Anna 
his mother was dead, he buried her with his father/ 

The foregoing remarks were in part suggested by a 
visit which I made to one of the most favourite and 
fashionable of English cemeteries. I was not pre- 
viously acquainted with the neighbourhood ; but I 
soon ascertained my near approach to the .spot by the 
number of stonemasons' yards which I passed, decked 
with urns, tablets, and other funereal sculptures. One 
having the advantage to overlook the entrance-gate 
of the cemeteiy was super-eminent in its attractions. 
Devices of carving and gilding, and blue paint, in 
every kind of shape, were so arranged as to form a 
sort of frontage to a large stonecutter's establishment, 



CEMETERIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. II5 

and these emblematical scrolls and devices were made 
* intelligible to the meanest capacity' by such flowing 
labels as the foUowing :- 

* Tomhsy MonumentSy and Ghravestones kept i/n 

repair y amd painted by the year, 

Oravea decorated with flowers, evergreens, &c. 

Designs and estimates made for the trade. 

Inscriptions cut a/ad blacked in the best manner. 

Ironwork of any description erected, repaired, 

a/nd pavnted/ 

In fact it was a ' m^lancholy-pleasure-of-showi/ng- 
you* shop on the most reasonable term& 

I entered the cemetery : a more beautiful and 
luxurious garden it is impossible to conceive. The 
season was autumn, and every path was radiant with 
dahlias, fuchsias, verbenas, heliotrope, salvias, lo- 
belias, geraniums, monthly roses, and a multitude of 
other flowers, in the richest bloom. Such fine African 
and French marigolds I never saw, though I thought 
them in very bad taste there. In some country 
churchyards, where the custom of planting flowers is 
most rife, none are thought of that are not sweelr 
scerUed. Merely beautiful looking flowers are never 
admitted, though it is said that these are sometimes 
planted by stealth, as a sort of satire, on the grave 
of an unpopular person. 

14 



Il6 god's ACBE. 

But on the graves of beloved ones the homely 
sweet-scented rosemary, emblem of remembrance, the 
aconite, the snow-drop, the violet^ and lily of the 
valley ; and the rose— ever the rose — ^type always of 
purity, affection, goodness : these are suitable to 
churchyard or cemetery. 

These, and the humble, unshowy, fragrant mignio- 
nette, had been in far better taste than the flaunting 
flowers to which I have referred. The beautiful 
laurustinus, flowering as it does the winter through, 
and the arbutus, with its elegant flower and gorgeous 
firuit, gleamed at frequent intervals, forming a beauti- 
ful relief to the gloomy cypress and dismal yew. It 
IB no unusual mistake in churchyards, as well as in 
modern cemeteries, to plant these latter shrubs so 
thickly — at the head and foot, for instance, of graves 
placed closely together — ^that they cannot possibly have 
room to grow ; and the effect of regular regimental 
rows of evergreens, dwarfed and crippled like stunted 
shrubs, is one rather ludicrous than solemn or touching. 

I had not proceeded fietr ere I came to a placard 
within the ground, noting that-— 

* (he Company tmdertake to tv/rf cmd 

pla/rvt gravesy cmd to mavnixmn cmd keep them m 
order i on thefollowvag terms ;— 

Perannum « • • « £ ^ i, 
In perpetuity « « • « £ „ „ 



CEMETERIES AND CfHABNEL-HOUSES. I17 

It is a pity that all the ' proprietors of graves ' are 
not acquainted with^ or are not inclined to avail 
themselves of, this notification. Some of the graves 
are in a sad and disreputable state of disorder. The 
clematis, planted by friends under the first impulse 
of grief, is trailing, disorderly, far and wide beyond its 
original and proper bounds; and the branches of 
cypress imnurtured, unpruned, forgotten, are sere 
and brown and unsightly ; and tank weeds and trail- 
ing neglected shrubs deface the very memorials graven 
on the tombs. 

In a plain churchyard, however neglected, decay 
does not strike such a feeling of desolation to the 
heart The long, rank grass, uncared for and un- 
pruned, is unsightly enough ; but it does not convey 
to the mind that idea of the forgetfuLneaa of the 
living which is raised by the sight of a grave once 
trim, and surrounded with costly exotic flowers, now 
carelessly suffered to dwindle and decay. 

In many parts of France, but more especially in 
the southern counties, specific monuments have been 
built in order to preserve that remembrance of the 
dead which is one of the highest and purest at- 
tributes of our humanity. These are the Lanternes 
DES MoRTS ; erections, the chief purpose of which 



ii8 god's agbe. 

is to throw light on the cemeteries during the hours 
of night and darkness.^ 

From M. de Caumont we find that, in the twelfth 
and thirteenth centuries, sepulchral chapels, or else 
hollow columns, were often erected in the middle of 
cemeteries, bearing on the summits lamps or lanterns, 
which by night cast their rays on all the surrounding 
tombs. 

The chapels vary much in size and style, some being 
highly elaborated and very ornamental, and having 
bases, with open pillars around, in which the 
deceased might be exposed to view, laid in state, or 
cared for as necessity might require before his inter- 
ment ; or here might be celebrated the office for the 
dead, and other usages of which the memory is lost 
M. de Caumont gives many sketches of these. 
They had for the most part the circular form, which 
was that of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. 

The ColoTvnea Creuses, which, much less costly, 

' Cours d'Antiquitis Monumeniales, yoI. vi. c. 4. These 
erections have been alluded to by no English writer whatsoever 
(except, as I learnt, after these pages were in type, one in the 
Archaologia), nor by any in France before M. de Caumont. 
For my knowledge of the existence of these buildings at all 
(and my sole illustration caused me a search of many days) I 
am indebted to the kind courtesy of James Parker, Esq., of 
Oxford. As also for some interesting notices of Breton customs, 
referred to in chapter viL 



CEMETERIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. II9 



* 



elaborate, and ornamental, still served the same pur- 
pose of throwing light on the tombs around, were 
merely hollow columns, sometimes ascended by a 
spiral inner staircase, sometimes only 'swarmed' up, 
on little projections within (as of late climbing-boys 
did up chimneys), and bearing a lantern at top— a 
sort of homage rendered to the memory of the dead — 
a signal reminding the pa^ers-by of their presence, 
and inviting to prayer. 

They are more especially met with in the ceme- 
teries touching on much frequented roads, being 
erected to preserve the living from the fear of ghosts 
and spirits of darkness, with whom the imagination 
of our ancestors peopled the places of burial during 
the night, and who were supposed always to be scared 
away by light ; and they were indeed especially to 
remind the living to pray for the dead. 

All these LantevTiea des JUorts, whether Chapelles 
FvmibreSy or Colonnea Creuses, have at their base 
altars placed at the east These were doubtless for 
religious observances, probably for the celebration of 
the Holy Sacrament ; and in the sepulchral cham- 
bers lay frequently the corpse, which in many dis- 
tricts would not be placed in its heavy stoUe coffin 
until its arrival at the place of interment 

My pilgrimage to the cemetery I have above re- 



120 god's ACBE. 

ferred to had an especial object. I wanted a par- 
ticular tomb, the grave of one whose memory I 
honoured. Unable myself to find it, I was compelled 
to apply to one of the persons employed on the 
ground, and he conducted me to it at once. How 
pleased was I to find a plain tombstone, perfectly 
t^lean and neat, in a remote secluded comer, with no 
flaunting exotics or emblazoned trophies to attract the 
eye of the careless lounger, but environed only by the 
verdant green turf which Nature herself cherishes. 

It was on the occasion of the interment at this 
grave that the touching incident really occurred 
which a poet's fancy had created long ago. Southey, 
in his Joan of Arc, writes, many a long year ago :— *• 

I remember as the bier 
Went to the grave, a lark Bpnmg np aloft. 
And soar'd amid the snnshine, caroljing 
So Ml of joy, tliat to the monmer's ear 
More mournfully than dirge or passing bell 
His joyftd carol cam e 

but it the funeral to which I allude this incident did 
occur, and was thus recorded by the friend and 
clergyman by whom the solemn service was read : — 

Over that solemn pageant mute and dark. 
Where in the grave we laid to rest 
Heaven's latest, not least welcome guest. 

What didst thou on the wing, thou jocund lark ! 
Hovering in unrebuked glee. 

And carolling above that moumftil company P 



■ n^-^^^^-^^^^^^m^gmt^mmmmmmt 



CEMETERIES AND CtiABNEL-HOXJSES. lit 

thou light-loving and melodious bird ! 

At every sad and solemn fall 

Of mine own voice, each interval 
In thy soul-elevating prayer, I beard 

Thy quivering descant fiill and dear—- 
Discord not inharmonious to the ear ! 

We laid her there, the minstrel's darling child ; 

Seemed it then meet that, borne away 

From the close city's dubious day. 
Her dirge should be thy native wood-note wild j 

Nursed upon nature's lap, her sleep 
Should be where birds may smg, and dewy flowerets weep ! 

On a vast tnany tombs were hung wreaths, or 
rather circlets of the yellow flower, the French im- 
morteUes, of which the common English country 
name is 'everlasting.' All these circlets were of 
precisely the same size, shape, and colour ; a perfect 
resemblance which evidenced ona^ hand in the pre- 
paration. 

I passed through the sepulchral chambers and 
expressed a wish to descend to the vaidts, which I 
was enabled to do for the fee of one shilling* These 
show vaults have certainly nothing dark, damp, lugu- 
brious, or unsightly about them — no tokens of decay as 
yet ; and so well planned are they, and so thoroughly 
ventilated, that no such natural result of humanity 
seems to be apprehended. They are just as much 
show places as the gardens above, only not so much 
frequented, because some don't like to descend the 



12a god's agbe. 

steps, and some don't like the look of a coffin, and 
some don't like to part with a shilling. The guide 
takes you up one corridor and down another, closely 
planted on each side with niches filled with coffins, 
several of them Mastered up, but the greater propor- 
tion left partly open to display the ornaments on the 
head of the coffin, which ever aad anon^ when very 
handsome, are pointed «ut to you by the conductor. 
Miserable foppery 1 

Where are the feelisgs of solemnity and awe with 
which liie mi&d ought to be imbued in such a scene 
as this, when M every turn you are called upoa to 
admire those .clustered gilt nails — ^that .rich ormolu 
ornament — that golden ^andle^-^that -elaborate in- 
scriptioQJ 

But once my guide stopped at a niche closed — ^yes, 
it was quite and entirely closed. No inquisitive ^eye 
could pry into its recesses. 

* Aye,' be said, aftd he tapped on the wall with his 
keys, ^aye, but here's a young lady here as is a deal 
more thought on tban them folks wi& the fine gisand 
coffins.' 

* A young lady V 

' Aye, quite young. I remember the time, it's just 
about three years ago, and a sight of folks come after 
her yet' 

* Come after her ! what for V 



CEBIETERIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. T123 

' Oh, just to cry. They will always come down into 
the vault at once. They was some on 'em here only 
the day afore yesterday, and how they did cry, to be 
sure ! Poor young thing ! They were very fond of 
her, I reckon.' 

The man's tone and manner expressed so much 
feeling that my heart softened towards him, and I 
inwardly vowed to bestow another sixpence on him. 
At that moment my eye was caught by a coffin of 
huge dimensions, black, without ornament, but dusty- 
looking, and quite uncanopied ; giving one the idea 
of a lumber chest put on a shelf, ^ out of the way.' 

* Whose coffin is that V 

* That ! oh, that holds the biggest rogue in Chris- 
tendom;' and the man sneered somewhat, and 
entered upon the history of the ' rogue' with such 
evident gusto, that on parting from him I neglected 
my intended guerdon of an extra sixpence. 

Mine be a grave — ^not in a fashionable cemetery 
where aU indifferent visitors may scan the decora- 
tions of your coffin for the *low price of one shilling.' 
Nor would I wish to be buried even in the open 
ground of one of these modem depositories, where 
city wives bring their children for a ' country excur- 
sion' on a summer holiday, and ply them with cakes 
and oranges all the way ; or where povrU-device fops 



124 <^I>'S '^CB^ 

and simpering misses lisp their puerile nohsensd — 
not lovers! only idlers. A lovers' tryste, be the 
rank and manners of the parties what they may-if 
there be true faith, pure affection, earnest love — a 
lovers' tryste is a holy thing. 

Neither would I wish to be buried in the dark, 
cold vaults of a church — ^as much too dark and 
noisome, as those of a modem cemetery are too airy 
and light 

But may I lie in a churchyard, with at least the 
pure fresh air blowing over me. Let the ' dust' be 
resolved ^to dust/ the ^ ashes to ashes,' as soon as 
may be, ' in hope of a joyful resurrection.' Let the 
free aiy of Heaven blow over my grave, the green 
fresh grass wave over it also ; the trees blossom near, 
and young lovers meet under their shade. May such 
be the grave in which I shall hereafter rest ! 

Whilst transcribing these notes, the following 
applicable lines from Beattie's Mi/nstrd were placed 
before me — 

Let vanity adorn the marble tomb 

With trophies, rhymes, and 'scutcheons of renown. 
In the deep dungeon of some Gbthic dome. 

Where might and desolation ever frown : 
Mine be the breeey hill that skirts the down, 

Where a green grassy turf is all I crave, 
With here and there a violet bestrewn. 

Fast by a brook or fountain's murmuring wave, 
. And many an evening sun shine sweetly on my grave ! 



CEMETEBIES AND CHAKNEL-HOUSES. 



1^5 



We have the simaar testimony of another poet. 

Allan Cunningham was ofltered by Chantrey a 
place in his own new elaborate mausoleum. The 
reply was— ' 

* No, no. Ill not be built over when I am dead ; 
III lie where the wind shall blow, and the daisy grpw 
upon my grave.* 



LAN.TEBKBS pES MOBTS, 

At Mauriac, in Anvergne, there is one of these lanterns in 
the cemetery, and a deed is extant of the donation, in 1268, by 
one of the clergy, for a candle to be lighted every Saturday in 
the lantern which he had boilt^ 

Also a short distance from the Abbey of Fontevranlt, is a 
Mortuary Chapel, founded by a nun of the abbey, in the louvre 
of which is supposed to have been placed the lantern for the 
dead. — ArcJuBohgia, vol. xxziv. p. 285. 



CHAPTER VI. 

INTERMENT. 
GS&IETERIES AND CHABK£L-HOUS£S — COrUinued. 

TT is no slight justification of our fancy for a grave 
■^ in the open air, that opinion of a learned author 
that burial-vaults were originally used by heathens, 
who in their dark and hopeless belief supposed that 
spirits hate the light, and love to haunt the places 
where their bodies were laid. Such, it is supposed by 
some, was the purpose to which those celebrated 
catacombs near Rome were originally put, which 
were afterwards appropriated by the early Christians 
to the burial of their martyred brethren, when their 
faith was an object of persecution, and all their rites 
had to be performed in secret But the first cause of 
the excavations themselves seems to have been the 
digging for Pozzuolana,which, used in the composition 
of mortar and other things, was quarried to a great 
extent, both for home consumption and exportation. 
These subterraneous labyrinths branch out many 
miles in various directions. Those under the church 
of St. Sebastian alone, are said to have been explored 
to the extent of above fifteen milea 



CEMETEBIES AND CHABNEL-HOUSES. 1 27 

Intennent in the open air, or in places of worship, 
is supposed to have been first introduced by Christians. 

There are many splendid catacombs on the Con- 
tinent besides the far-famed Boman ones. Those of 
Naples, for instance, are described as far more noble 
and spacioua 

The catacombs in Paris are supposed to contain 
the remains of at least three millions of human 
beings. To these we shall presenUy recur. 

Brydone, in his Tour through Sicily y refers to a 
catacomb at Palermo, the burial-place of the Capuchin 
Convent. It is a vast subterranean apartment^ 
divided into large galleries, the walls of which are 
scooped into a multitude of niches as for the reception 
of statues, where are placed the dead bodies of the 
Capuchins who have died in the convent since its 
foundation, as well as the remains of several persons 
from the city. But how ghastly, how revolting, the 
figures there placed ! Hundreds of dead bodies, dressed 
in the clothes worn in life, and fixed upright ! Some 
have been there upwards of two hundred and fifty 
years. No embalmment, no antiseptic properties of 
atmosphere, can render such other than repulsive 
objects. One traveller says it is difficult to express 
the disgust arising from the ridiculous assemblage of 
distorted mummies here hung up by hundreds. 
Another, ' a preservation like this is horrid.^ Another^ 



128 god's ACRfe 

^ ^ < notwithstanding beiiig in the midst of more than 

a thousand lifeless bodies, we could not help smiling/ 
We hear, however, of the Incas of Peru being so 
wonderfully preserved by a preparation first of snow 
and then of bituminous matter, that they appeared 
as if alive. Garcilasso de la Yega describes his ances^ 
tors, whom he saw in 1579, after two hundred years' 
intombment, as being entire and perfect, robed in 
their usual habits, and sitting upright with their 
arms folded on their breasts. This fact, or tradition, 
or one of a similar nature, has been seized upon and 
turned to startling account in Eugene Sue's romance 
of The Wcmdering Jew. 

* In the city of Kiow, on the banks of the Dnieper, 
are spacious crypts, supposed to have been hollowed 
out about the end of the tenth century, when Chris- 
tianity was introduced into that country. They 
contain a vast number of bodies in perfect preserva- 
tion. This incorruptibility, attributable to the soil, 
is ascribed by the vulgar to the sanctity of the 
inmates ; and doubtless this error is greatly encouraged 
by the custom of the priests' visiting the crypt 
annually in Easter week, and formally addressing the 
bodies, and censing them with incense.^ 

^ When the Court went to visit the lying in state of the dead 
Dauphin {eldest son of Louis XYI.), the groom of the chambers 
announced to the corpse the persons entering. 



CEMETERIES AND CHABHEL-HOUSES. 12,^ 

. Tbere is a deiep interest iatitached (to tike catacombs 
in Borne from" tbe circmkistance of their being the 
site of the first Ghristiah churcbe& Feter^ Abbot of- 
Cluniv says that when he was at B6me he saw the 
ancient crypts, oratories, and altars, which had been 
raised by the Christians in the time of the apostlea 

The sepulchres of the martyrs were nide and 
solemn. In the catacombs the inscriptions and 
emblems over the Christian graves are very simple, 
soch as — *Tlie holy martyr, Maximus;' 'In pace 
HippoUtns amator pauperum;' ' Qregoria in pace,' &c. 

Many rudely carved emblems also there are of birds, 
fish, crossed palms, the monogram of Christy often 
between twelve doves ot lambs, representing Christ 
and his apostles. The phcsnix, an emblem of immor- 
tality and of resurrection, is often used: the crown is 
a funereal sign of the highest antiquity. 

Several altars are there in these sepulchres; a 
collateral testimony of the celebration always of the 
Holy Eucharist at funerala 

We should not think catacombs inviting places of 
resort ; but if all be true that is reported, an effectual 
way has been taken to render some of them attrac- 
tive. It is said, for instance, with regard to the 
catacombs in the churchyard of the Vatican, that 
women are allowed to enter them only on one day 
in the year — that is on Whit Sunday. In Paris, how- 

K 



X30 OODS ACBE. 

ever, there is an especial day^ All Souls' Day, on 
which the Parisians are in the habit of visiting their 
cemeteries from feelings of affection and piety. It is 
indeed a day set apart by all of their communion 
for the solemn commemoration of the departed ; and 
in serious and devout guise do they visit the tombs 
of their dead relationa 

There are vaults in the cemetery of the church of 
St Michael in Dublin, of whicli the atmosphere has 
the peculiar quality of protracting for many years 
the process of animal decay, so that it is not unusual 
to see coffins crumbling away, and the uncorrupted 
corpse exposed to view. There is a vault also in 
Bosslyn Chapel where the ' lordly line of high St 
Clair' repose, so dry, that bodies have been found 
entire after eighty yeaxs' interment 

In the peat mosses of Derbyshire bodies have 
been found uncorrupted after twenty-nine years' 
interment 

In dry, says Mr. Pettigrew, and especially in 
calcareous vaults, bodies may be preserved for a 
great length of time. In Toulouse, for instance, they 
are to be seen quite perfect although buried two 
centuries ago. In some parts of the Canary Islands 
bodies are found in an upright position in perfect 
preservation, though supposed to have been interred 
upwards of five hundred je^is. 



■a— sg^B ■.■wi I ^ 



CEMETERIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. J3I 

' It were almost idle, so well is it known, to refer to 
the * Dead House' on Mount St Bernard, where the 
icy atmosphere so preserves the dead, that (to borrow 
the words of a popular writer), ' the mother, storm- 
belated many winters ago, still standing in the comer 
and her baby at her breast, will dwell together in- 
separable, outlasting generations who will come to 
see them/ 

These exceptions to the general course of nature 
do but confirm, if such confirmation were wanting, its 
inevitable law. 

There seems to be no doubt that a decent and 
reverent regard to the mouldering relics of humanity 
caused charnel-houses to be a common appendage to 
cathedral and conventual churches A chapel was 
generally erected close by, or over them, for the pur- 
pose of saying mass for the souls of the unknown 
dead. Almost every churchyard in Brittany (a 
district which affords such striking mementoes of 
early usages, and which has been aptly called the 
Cornwall of France) has, or had, its ossuarium. In 
the northern part, being built generally of wood, 
they have been to a great extent destroyed ; in the 
southern part they were of stone. They occupied 
generally one comer of the churchyard, the Calvary 
being usually placed in the centre. They seem not 

K12 



■P 



I^Cb god's acre. 

to h&ve existed: in. their present shape before the 
fifte^ath century : some of the finest are of the seven- 
teenth,' and many of them had curious insciiptions. 
On one at Quimper^ recently destroyed, were the 
words— ^ 

Yons qui par illec passez 
Priez pour les trepassez. 

The remains of the dead were not placed in these 
charnel-houses until they had lain in the earth some 
time. In some instances the d^ulls are ranged in 
order on shelves ; some are even painted, and initials 
marked on the forehead. In others they lie scattered 
irregularly. When the ossuary is full, all the bones are 
removed with solemnity, under the superintendence 
of the clergy, to a large grave dug for the purpose. 

Many, even in Brittany, have been turned from 
their original purposes to school-houses, &c. One is 
the council-chamber of the Commune, and one is a 
post-office. 

One of the most celebrated charnel-houses abroad 
is that of St. Maria in Fortici, ^t Favia, containing the 
bones of ten thousand French soldiers, slaughtered 
in that celebrated battle where Francis I. 4ost all 
but honour.' 

r 

Attached to the convent of St Catharine, on 
Mount Sinai, is a charnel-house. To privileged visi- 
tors the vault is shown where formerly the bodies of 



CEMETERIES ANB CHARNEL-HOUSES. 1^33 

deceased monks were placed on an iron bedstiead, 
until only the 'dry bones remained ; now they are 
interred for three years, or longer, if necessary. A 
certain portion of this catacomb is filled with skulls 
only; and in front of these a large display of bones, 
in layers, the feet and shoulders being ptex^ed outwards 
alternately, and by the side of the last skeleton a 
vacant place -for the next that should be teady. 
There are m<H:e than thirty thousd^nd skeletons in 
this cemet^. 

There were many charnel-houses in England. At 
the west door of Norwich Cathedral, Bishop Salmon, 
in the fourteenth century, built a house for fout 
priests^ with a chapel, under which wd.s a l^ault for the 
reception of all the hiimab bones dug up from thief' city. 
This building is now a school-hduscf. 

On the north side of St. PauFs churchyard was 
formerly a similar chapel, with a chamel-heuse 
beneath. It was existing in the reign of Edward I., 
after which period several chantries were founded on it 

At Croyland, at Stratford-upon-AT<«, and many 
other places^ have erections been traced, satisfactorily 
establishing the conjecture that charnel-houses were 
usual appendages to cathedral and conventual 
churches. 

It seems almost a pity to destroy long-<;herished 
traditions; but learned antiquarians have decided 



134 god's Acre. 

that the bones in the charnel-house at Waltham 
Abbey are not those of the slain in the battle of 
Hastings. Still more cruel is the research which 
robs Hythe of its legend 

Hythe is one of the original Cinque Ports; and 
the church, which is finely placed on an eminence, 
and is built in the form of a cross, has many remains 
of beautiful and finished architecture. Beneath the 
chancel is a large crypt, to which anciently there 
were entrances both on the north and south sides ; 
but the latter is completely choked up. 

This crypt contains the ' lion' of the town — ^to wit, 
a pile of human skulls and bones, about twenty-eight 
feet long and seven or eight feet high. These are 
supposed to be one portion of the revolting testi- 
monies of a fearful battle of the Britons, imder Vor- 
timer, and the Saxons, in the year A.D. 456 (of 
which, however, there is no mention under this year in 
the Saxon Chronicle), between Hythe and Folkestone. 

It was shortly after this battle that Yortimer died, 
and commanded that a brazen pyramid should be 
erected in the poi*t where the Saxons had been 
accustomed to land. He ordered his body to be 
buried on the top of it, supposing that the very sight 
of his tomb would scare away the invaders. 

It is said that, at the time of this battle, there was 
a windmill on the shore at Hythe — the ancient 



CEMETERIES AND GHARKEL-HOUSES. I35 

Hythe, of which all traces have been long swept away 
— and that the miller, * a rogue in grain/ of course, 
placed a private signal, a lanthorn, on a certain con* 
spicuous pinnacle of his mill, when the Saxons, with 
whom he had a secret treaty, might advantageously 
make a hostile descent He did so; but the country 
people from all parts rose in immense numbers, and, 
* by the help of God, overcame their enemies/ The 
slaughter was, however, tremendous. 

After lying on the shore for centuries, till they 
were bleached to a perfect whiteness, these wave- 
swept bones were collected in two heaps, one of 
which was deposited, as we have said, in the crypt at 
Hythe, the other at Folkestone. The latter were 
supposed to be those of the Saxons, the former. of 
the Britons. * 

Folkestone, where one half of these ghastly relics 
was deposited, is a most romantically situated place 
(and, since the formation of the railway, has become 
a much frequented one, as a convenient port for the 
Continent), between Dover and Hythe* The present 
church is on a lofty cli£f near the coast, and so near 
it that it may not improbably, in the course of some 
years, share the fate of a former one, of which all 
idea is lost under the waves of the advancing sea.^ 

^ It is sixteen years since I saw Folkestone as described in the 
text. 



■M 



136 god's acre. 

Leland, in the time of Henry VIIL, writes: — *The 
.towne shore is merveludy.sore wasted with the vio- 
lence of the se ; yn so much, that there they -say that 
one paroche chyrche of Our Lady, and another of St 
Paule, ys dene destroyed, and etin by these/ So 
whether these- relics have been, as antiquarians say, 
.merely collected from; time- to time from. different 
churchyards^ in accordance' with the original' purpose 
of charnel-houses, or whether, as tradition aflSrms, 
they be those of slaughtered Saxons, it seems not 
improbable that their repose will be. once more in- 
vaded, ,and that they will, be swept to that * great 
ohamel-house where no intrusion can disturb 1 them, 
no power remove, until ^ the trumpet shall sound and 
the dead shall arise/ For — 

The sea's abyss is one large grave, 

A churchyard is its face, 
A tombstoiie is each rising ward. 

To mark the bnriaL-place. 

Oh, we should see in depths below. 

Were that vast flood nm dry. 
The sleepers all^— a ghastly row ; 
Should see how round their white bones grow 

The crimson polypi ; 

See their sand cushions laid beneath 

With weeds and moss spread over; 
How (m the fish they grin with teeth. 

Which lips no longer cover. 



m/t^mmmmmm 



CEBIETEBIES AND OHABNEL-HOUSES. I37 

And how the bones that once were anng. 

The busy sword-fish burnish ; . 
And how the mermaids come in swarms. 

Their marv'lous gifts to famish. 

We should see hands and wrist-bones shine 

With amber bracelets bound ; 
We should see branching coral twine 

Those fleshless skulls around. „ 

The catacombs now the most frequently visited 
and the most usually referred to^ are those of Paris, 
formed in the immense vaults by which the city was 
almost undermined by the quarrying of Pozzuolano. 
This work having gone on without rule or order from 
time immemorial, each quarrier working where he 
listed, the extent of the undermining was hardly 
known but by popular tradition, until some alarming 
accidents attracted the attention of Government, and a 
special commission of inquiry was appointed. Churches, 
palaces, were found tottering, whole streets and roads 
sinking, and engineers were in great request. This was 
in the year 1774; in 1777 a Commission was appointed, 
and ultimately these quarries were appropriated by 
parliamentaiy decree to their present purpose. 

For, for many centuries, Paris had had only one 
churchyard — St Innocents, a royal domain without 
the walls, given by one of her monarchs as a burial- 
place to the citizens. 

Philip Augustus enclosed it. It was afterwards 



138 god's acre. 

enlarged; but as generation after generation continued 
to be buried in the same ground, the result may be 
imagined. 

The fosses communes were emptied once in thirty 
or forty years, and the bones were deposited in the 
great charnel-house — ^an arched gallery surrounding 
the burial-ground, which had been given and erected 
from time to time by various donors, as a work of 
piety.^ 

The last gravedigger in Paris, Fran9ois Fontraci, 
attested that in less than thirty years he had depo- 

^ In the year 1389, Nicholas Flamel, a scrivener, and his wife 
Femelle, built one of these Arcades. Many other citizens con- 
tributed to this as to a work of religion, and their arms or 
initials were carved over the vaults. Nicolas Boulard was par- 
ticularly distinguished as one of these pious citizens. The in- 
scription upon one vault stated that it was built by Pierre 
Potier, furrier and citizen of Paris, in honour of Grod, and of the 
blessed Virgin Mary, and all the blessed saints of Paradise — 
' Pour mettre les ossemens des trepasses. Priez Dieu pour lui 
et pour les trepasses.' 

Flamel built at his own expense the portal of the church of 
St. Jacques de la Boucherie. The inscription stated that this 
portal was built in honour of God by one of the parishioners and 
his wife, in the year of grace 1388. 'Pray for the benefactors 
of this,* it added, * and for all others who have business in it, if 
you please.' 

Flamel also built one of the columns of the nave; also contri- 
buted to the portal of the church of St. Genevieve la Petite, 
1403 ; also built the chapel of the Hospital of St. Gervais. 



CEBfETEBIES AND CHABNEIr-HOUSES. I39 

sited upwards of ninety thousand bodies in one 
cemetery, in which, even since the time of PhiKp 
Augustus, one million two hundred thousand had 
been interred ; and it had been used as a cemetery 
for ages before. 

A portion of the quarries designed for the modem 
far-famed cemetery was walled off, an entry made 
into it, and a wall sunk, down which to project the 
bones ; the roof was supported by props, and then the 
ceremony of consecrating these catacombs was per- 
formed with great solemnity. 

As was also the removal of the bones. By night, 
by the wavering uncertain flare of torches, rendering 
the darkness visible, in pall-covered funeral cars^ 
with religious ordinance and holy rite, stoled priests 
chanting the solemn service for the dead, the people 
attending in reverence and awe : thus were the 
heretofore desecrated bones of long past generations 
consigned to the resting-place prepared and conse- 
crated for their reception. All was in keeping — 
simple, devout, solemn, and most singularly im- 
pressive. 

These scenes were commemorated by artists of the 
first eminence. 

But the hallowing feeling so conspicuous at this 
time was lost in the debasing influence of the Revo- 
lution. Then, relics from devastated and desecrated 



140 god's acre. 

churches, and newly-killed yictimB of popular mad- 
ness, were- alike deposited here, without holy service 
or ceremony; nay, too often without order or de- 
cency, in tumultuous heaps, mingling with accumu- 
lated rubbish ; while that burying-place termed La 
Tombe Isoire was publicly sold, the leaden coffins 
melted, the monumente destroyed, and a saUe de 
dcmse opened on the spot^ 

This Tomb Isoire was a part of the quarries under 
the Plaine de Mont Souris, whioih was originally 
allotted for the reception of the dead when their 
removal from the Cimeti^re des Innocens was first 
agreed on ; and all the crosses, tombstones, and 
monuments whioh were not reclaimed by the families 
of the dead to whom they belonged, had been placed 

here. These were now destroyed with brutal out- 
rage. : 

^ ' Now, however, society b^an to resume its ordinary course, 
and the business and pleasures of life succeeded each other as 
usual. But eiren social pleasures brought with them strange 
and gloomy associations with that Valley of the Shadow of 
Death through which the late pilgrimage of France appeared to 
have lain. An assembly for dancing, very much frequented by 
the youth of both sexes and highly fashionable, was called the 
'Ball of Victims.' The qualification for attendance was the 
having lost some near and valued relation or friend in the late 
Beign of Terror. The hair and head-dress were so arranged as 
to resemble the preparations made for the g^lotine, and the 
motto adopted was ' We dance amidst tombs.' ' 



CEMETERIES AITD CHiJtNEL-HOUSES. 141 

Not UQtil the year, of graice i8jo were the |>ioas' 
designs of the first at)prdpriator& of these quarries in a 
fair way of jrealizatitm. 

Then, the ;fotmation> of the catacombs in their > 
present ordei! Was began and ' resized. Then sluices 
were made f or ' dird^age^ pillars built t6 support the 
roof, staircases madel ^throughout. The skulls : and 
bones were r^ged sXi>vg the walk — those of peculiar 
formation, <;>r exhibiting tokens of marked disease, 
being placed in a separate chamber for. scientific 
examinatif)tn — a&d suitable ornaments and inscriptions 
were appended thtoughout 

Such are the datacomba of Paris. 

How inappropriately and indecorously many of 
these crypts are named, can only be matter of regret ; 
as the miserable foppery of an album there, to record 
the name or the impromptu couplet of any chance 
visitor, is also. 

A very curious circumstance, scientifically speaking, 
was exhibited in the dismemberment of the old 
burial-pit& One of those opened in 1779 was raised, 
by the accumulation pf corpses therein, eight feet 
above the ground-floor of the adjoining house& 

It may be easily supposed that here, as elsewhere, 
the abuse would have gone on without remedy, had 
not disgust and loathing, fever and pestilence, at' 



149 god's acbe. 

■ 

length, trumpet-tongued, reached the rulers of the 
land ; and it cannot be doubted, says the historian, 
^but that worse consequences than were actually 
experienced from the horrible accumulation of corpses 
in the Cemetery of St Innocents must have resulted, 
if the bodies had not undergone this changa^ 

This was the transmutation of the mass of decom- 
posed bodies into a substance called adipocire ; which, 
according to a writer in the Quarterly RevieWy was a 
re*discovery of a substance known to Sir Thomas 
Browne, as a mode of preparing it was by Lord Bacon; 
but it seems afterwards to have been lost sight of, 
scientifically, until this re-discovery in Fari& Prac- 
tically it was familiar to the lower classes. Shak- 
speare, who forgot nothing, says — 

The soyereign'st thing on earth 
Was parmaceti, for an inward bruise. 

But our writer adds, that these classes regarded the 
use of spermaceti in medicine with prejudice and 
horror^ because adipocire having some of the pro- 
perties of wax or spermaceti, they not unnaturally 
confounded the two substance& 

This change 
Into something rich and strange, 

is said to have counteracted much of the evil which 



CEMETEBIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. 143 

must otherwise have resulted from the loathsome 
corruption of the Cimeti^re des Innocens.^ 

Perhaps we may hardly find a more appropriate 
place for a few remarks on an exploded belief of our 
forefathers, and closely connected indeed with the 
main subject of this book, I refer to the use and the 
virtue of Mummy powder. 

Little thought that wise and celebrated nation of 

^ ' Once indeed he (Mtna, the Spanish patriot) did shock me. 
He was to accompany us to a ball, and when he arrived he found 
my father, who was waiting the conclusion of my mother's toilet 
in the drawing-room, while I was seated, like Cinderella in the 
chimney comer, wrapped up in caps and shawls, watching the 
cup of tisanne to which I was condemned as a remedy for a vio- 
lent attack of cold and cough. He, with his usual good-nature, 
sympathized with me on my disappointment in missing the 
evening's anticipated pleasures ; and, as usual with all but the 
stiff sons of Britain, inquired what were, in addition to the never- 
failing tisanne, the remedies I was submitting to. On my re- 
plying that the doctor threatened me with a blister— 

* * Do not put on any such thing,' said he ; ' but instead of it 
get a plaster of dead man*s fat^ and it will cure you directly.' 

^ My dear &ther found the words I could not to express our 
united impolite horror at such a prescription. 

* * Why,' said Mina, ' it is the commonest thing in the world 
in Spain. When I had the wound in my thigh, I had such a 
salve applied for weeks to it, and it cured me.' 

* ' Thanks to the French General who made it so abundant,' 
added my Mh^x* "^ Jtecollectiona qf Mina, the Spanish 
JPatriot, 



144^ ood's acbb. 

old, who einbahned their r^latifveB vrith. costly; spices, 
laid them in elaboraftely worked coffiiui^ .and en-' 
tombed them in those gorgeous catacombs and massy 
pyramids which they ihight well hope wouUL enclose 
them till the judgment daj^-4itiile could they suppose 
that their gigantic ikiasonry would be unsealed, their 
costly coffins rifled, and^that^ by the very : process 
which they had used for their everlasting preserva- 
tion, ifie bodies of those they loved in life, and tended 
so reverentially in death, converted into medicine, or 
what was thought so, would be broken up, weighed,, 
and sold by grain and scruple, hj adventurous mer- 
chants or itinerant dealers, throughout the whole 
civilized world. Oh ! parody on human science ! 
oh ! exquisite satire on human hopes and mortal 
aspirations and foresight ! 

' Mummy,^ said the great philosopher Boyle, ' is one 
of the useful medicines commended and given by 
our physicians for falls and bruises, and in other 
cases too/ 

^Mummy,^says Lord Bacon, ^hath great force in 
staunching blood, which may be ascribed to the 
mixture of balms that are glutinous.' 

And this is very credible; but we are apt tx) 
believe in these days that the same concentration of 
imguents and spices might have an equally effica- 
cious effect without the admixture of the human 



CEMETERIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. I45 

frame. Such was not the opinion formerly. The 
virtue was certainly ' supposed to be more in the 
Egyptian than the spice \ and when this drug was 
in high appreciation, what was sold as virgin mummy 
always obtained the highest price. How much it 
was in request we may learn from the circumstance 
that one traveller brought six hundred-weight of 
mummy, broken into pieces, to the Turkey Qompany. 

We need hardly say that this substance does not 
form part of the Materia Medica of our day. 

But so late as the sixteenth and part of the seven- 
teenth centuries it was an accredited ingredient of 
the Pharmacopoeia, was sold by all apothecaries, and 
was an important article of commerce. As with 
many other matters in those times, the Jews of the 
East were the chief merchants, though many specu- 
lators embarked in the trade ; for it was very lucra- 
tive, and heavy sums were expended on what was 
then considered so valuable a medicine. 

As early, we are told, as the year 11 00 an expert 
Jewish physician, named Elmagar, a native of Alex- 
andria, was in the constant habit of prescribing 
mummy to his patients, and the example was univer- 
sally followed in cases of bruises and wounds. The 
asphalte and bitumen were thought to consolidate 
and heal the broken and lacerated veins, and the 
piquancy of the medicine usually causing sickness, 

L 



145 god's acre. 

wag deemed very efficacious to the stomach, causing 
it to void any coagulated blood. 

But avei^e, natiqrally and reasonably, to the dis- 
interment of bodies from the sepulchres where they 
had been laid to rest for all tim^,. the Government 
of Egypt (as this remedy became more in request) 
threw heavy difficulties in the way of their removal 
Then imposition commenced, and was practised on a 
wide scale for a long period. 

The Jews entered upon a speculatiou to furnish 
the mummies wanted without special reference to the 
originality of the article required They soon ren- 
dered themselves independent of Egyptian tombs and 
Government edicts. 'They took all the executed 
criminals and corpses of all descriptions that could be 
obtained, filled the head and inside of the bodies with 
simple asphaltum, an article of very small price, 
made incisions into the muscular parts of the limbs, 
inserted into them also the asphaltum, and then 
bound them up tightly. This being done, the bodies 
were exposed to the heat of the sun; they dried 
quickly and resembled in appearance the truly pre- 
pared mummies. They were sold to the Christiana' 

But we are told a horrible tale. In the year 
1564, Guy de la Fontaine, physician to the King of 
Navarre, being at Alexandria, obtained ready per- 
mission from the principal Jew connected with this 



CEMETEBIES AND CHARNEL-HOUSES. I47 

traffic to look at his mummies, and saw many bodies 
heaped one upon another. These bodies, thirty or 
forty in number, had been prepared by this Jew 
during the last four years : they had been gathered 
indiscriminately, anyhow, nor did he, he laughingly 
declared, care of what disease they had died, even 
were it leprosy, small-pox, or plague. When em- 
balmed, ' no one could tell ;' but he ' marvelled how 
the Christians, so daintily-mouthed, could eat of the 
bodies of the dead.' 

It is said that Francis I. always carried about with 
nim a little mummy powder mixed with pulverized 
rhubarb; and with this remedy always available, 
thought himself fortified against illness or accident 
The demand for it was greater in France than in any 
other country. 

In its day it must have rivalled the Morrison's 
Pills of ours. One of the most celebrated of ancient 
physicians (Avicenna) speaks of it as useful ' in cases 
of abscesses and eruptions, firactures, concussions, 
paralysis, hemicrania, epilepsy, vertigo, spitting of 
blood from the lungs, affections of the throat, coughs, 
palpitation of the heart, debility of the stomach, 
nausea, disorders of the liver and spleen, internal 
ulcers, also in cases of poisons,' and for contusions the 
best of all remedies. It is prescribed to be taken in 
decoctions of marjoram, thyme, elder-flower, barley, 

L2 



148 god's acre. 

roses, lentils, jujubes, cummin-seed, caraway, saffiroo, 
cassia, parsley, with oxymel, wine, milk, butter, 
castor, mulberries, &c. 

The disuse of mummy generally was caused by no 
idea of its inefficacy, but by the revelation of a Chris- 
tian slave, who being misused by his master, a 
Jew mummy merchant of Damietta, denounced his 
fraudulent practices to the authorities. The Jew 
was imprisoned, and enormously fined; and stimu- 
lated by the prospect of wealth, the governors of 
many Egyptian cities followed the example set 
them by the Pacha of Damietta^ and exacted such 
exorbitant fines from mummy merchants, that the 
Jews could no longer continue the trade. 

But it is said that even to this day the Arabs use 
mummy powder mixed with butter as a medicine. 
They call it manieyy and esteem it an infallible 
remedy for bruises, external or internal.^ 

*That mummy is medicinal* (wrote Sir Thomas 
Brown) Hhe Arabian Dr. Haly delivereth and divers 
confirm ; but of the particular uses thereof, there is 



* It was not, however, merely for medicinal purposes that the 
spoliation of Egyptian tombs was resorted to. In the twelfth 
century, the country people stripped the mummies of whatever 
was of substance sufficient to make garments, and sold the rags 
of the mummy-cloth to the paper-makers, to make paper for the 
use of the grocers. 



CEMLETEBIES AND GHABNEL-HOUSES. 1 49 

much discrepancy of opinioiL While Hofmannus 
prescribes the same to epileptics, Johan de Muralto 
commends the use thereof to gouty persons. Bacon 
likewise extols it as a styptic ; and Junkenius con- 
siders it of efficacy to resolve coagulated blood. 
Meanwhile, we hardly applaud Francis I. of France, 
who always carried mummies with him a« a panacea 
against all disorders; and were the efficacy thereof 
more clearly made out, scarce conceive the use 
thereof allowable in . physic ; exceeding the bar- 
barities of Cambyses, and turning old heroes 
unto unworthy potions. Shall Egypt lend out her 
ancients unto chirurgeons and apothecaries, and 
Cheops and Psammeticus be weighed unto us for 
drugs? Shall we eat of Chamnes and Amasis in 
electuaries and pills, and be cured by cannibal mix- 
tures? Surely such diet is miserable vampirism; 
and exceeds in horror the black banquet of Domitian, 
not to be paralleled except in those Arabian feasts; 
wherein ghoules feed horribly/ 

Yet it is possible that this use of human mummy 
may have originated in the supposed valuable pro- 
perties of a resinous liquid which exudes from certain 
stones and mountains, and which is said to have been 
anciently used by the Greeks to preserve their dead 
bodies from putrefaction. It is called mumia, 
mumie, momie, 'le baume-momie.' Sir William 



150 god's acbe. 

Ouseley visited a ' mummy mountain' in Persia. He 
said it had a darker appearance than the adjacent 
mountains. A blackish bituminous matter oozes 
from it in very small quantities, but it is considered 
by Persians as far more precious than gold, being 
deemed of miraculous efficacy in healing cuts and 
bruises in a moment ; and, taken internally, a sove^ 
reign specifia It used to be gathered for the king ; 
agents, &c., being appointed to guard it. The pro- 
duce of a year amounted only to the size of a pome- 
granate. It was sealed up in the presence of priests 
and magistrates, and placed in the royal treasury. 
This was the case even in the tenth century. 

A trifle of this baurae-wxynde was presented by 
the Persian ambassador to Louis XIY. in a gold box, 
and to the Prince of Cond^ in a silver one. In the 
year 1809, Mirza Abul Hassan brought a little of it 
as a gift from the King of Persia to Queen Charlotte; 
and the Empress of Russia received a like present 
(about an ounce) in a gold box. At Isfahan, about 
eight pounds sterling was demanded from a gentle- 
man of Sir William Ouseley's party for as much as 
could be contained in a common-sized walnut-shell. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE CBOSS. 

It stood where ev'ry eye might see. 
That tum'd its glance to Heaven ; 

Telling of God in agony, 
That man might be forgiven. 

TXTE have noticed elsewhere that one especial 
symbol of the consecration of a churchyard 
was the erection of a cross, to remind us of the 
benefits vouchsafed to us by the cross of Christ 
No churchyard was formerly seen without it, mostly 
conspicuously placed in the centre of ihe area. 
There word frequently crosses at the four .comers 
also. After the third, century of the Christian earn, no 
church even was allowed to be erected until the 
bishop had first placed this holy symbol on the in-r 
tended site of the structura 

This distinctive characteristic, not of late adopted 
at all, is worn away, gone, lost sight of in church- 
yards even where formerly it did exist The fol- 
lowing reference, dated even so far back as 1449, jcon- 
ceming the church of St Mary Magdalene, in Milk- 
str^t, London, might be repeated of many other 
churchyards : — . 



152 god's acre. 

^ Sirs, ye shall understand that I am well remem- 
bred, how a pece of voide grounde lying in the 
parish of Saint Mary Magdalene in Milk-strete of 
London, on the west side of the same strete was 
com'nly named and called the ohirche-yard of Saint 
Mary Magdalene Chirche in Milk-strete aforesaide, 
and there stode a crosse in and uppon the same voide 
grounde of the height of a man or more, and that 
the same crosse was worshipped by the parisshens 
there as crosses be com'nly worshipped in other 
chircheyardes/ 

The last line refers of course to the prevalent abuse 
of that which was originally treated but as a symbol, 
pure, innocent, and holy. 

Did space permit, it would be an interesting task 
to trace the gradual progress of this emblem — ^the 
Cboss — ^from the time when, having borne the 
blessed Saviour, it was transformed from the most 
humiliating and despised token to the holiest of 
emblems; how from this due and reverential esti- 
mation of it as a memorial and symbol, it became itself 
an object of worship ; and how at length we have 
so zealously reformed this abuse, that the emblem 
itself has been banished from our churchea 

' In a thousand cases,' says a celebrated writer, ^ we 
have railed at superstition till we have recommended 
impieiy.' Or, in Mr. Evelyn's words : — 



THE CEOSS. 153 

* From the abuse of a thing to the non-use the 
consequence is not always valid.' 

The lucid, argumentative, and . critically logical 
Bishop Butler, the author of the Analogy y in a charge 
which he delivered to his clergy at Durham, pleaded 
for *the importance of external religion,' and *of 
forms which should daily bring the subject before 
men's thoughts, and lead bad men to repent, and 
good men to grow better.** 

' It may be cited as a practical exemplification of 
this opinion, that in repairing his private chapel at 
Bristol, Bishop Butler placed a cross over the altar 
there. This was destroyed during the burnings and 
riots of 1 83 1. 

So clearly did the enemies of Christianity perceive 
the moral influence of its one symbol, the Cross, that 
among the articles of capitulation to be observed by 
the Christians on the fall of Jerusalem, the Turks 
stipulated that they should place no crosses upon 
their churches, nor bear them about in procession. 

Stone pillars, or crosses, as they were called, are of 
great antiquity, and were very early used as boun- 
dary marks of lordships, parishes, or lands given to 
monasteries, or were erected in memory of any re- 
markable event, near the spot where a battle had 
been fought, or over the buried slain. 

There is an ancient cross with a Bunic inscription 



154 god's acbe. 

in Eyam cliurchyard — Eyam, the scene of the apo- 
stolic labours of Mr. Mompesson, and of the death of 
his high-hearted and devoted wife. This cross must 
once have been very beautiful. It is now mulcted of 
its &ir proportions, for' it lay prone and shattered for 
yeara One's interest in regarding it is enhanced by 
the fact that its re-erection was caused by the earnest 
int^osition of the philanthropist Howard. 

Among many which might be referred to, perhaps 
one of the memorial crosses most noted is Neifille's * 
Cro6s, near Durham, erected to perpetuate the victory 
over David Bruce, when he was taken prisoner in 
1346. This was broken down in the night, in the 
year 1589.^ 

Cornwall, Wales, and Ireland abound with wayside 
and * churchyard ' crossea These have usually four 
short equal limbs, and, with very few exceptions, are 
Greek crosses. They are found in conspicuous places, 
upon, hills or on widely extended downs. They tes- 



^ The traveller on the field of Cressy may yet see the remains, 
substantial though shattered, of a cross erected there to the 
memQry of the brave, blind old King of Bohemia, who was slain 
in the battle. His friends, seeing the day losl, wished to remove 
him— but no. 

' Shall 1/ exclaimed he, ' fly before an enemy P Let me suc- 
cour Philip and my son, quit the spot as a conqueror, or perish.' 

The random ' baleful' blows he struck are on record. 



THE CEOSa 155 

tify to a period anterior to Saxon Christianity, when 
the apostle-planted British Church flourished in our 
island. 

In Cornwall, especially, every parish contains several 
crosses, and almost every churchyard has one at least 
on the south side, facing the west, and usually raised 
on a mound or steps. 

There were a great many formerly in England, 
and often erected, it would appear, in the most deso- 
late districts. In the vast fens surrounding Croyland 
we read of there being immense crosses placed. 

It is said that the first Christians, at once 
assuming the emblem of our salvation, used to 
sign the cross on their foreheads on going out or 
coming in ; and in a short time portable crosses of 
light material, and simply in the form of that on 
which the Saviour sufifered, were introduced in the 
churches, and carried about in religious processions. 
Also it used to be customary to place a cross near 
the head of a dead person, from the period of his 
death to that of his interment, to show that he 
belonged to the religion of Christ. 

Constantino the Great had the cross emblazoned on 
his banner ; and many centuries later, it was, as we 
know, borne along in the Holy Wars, where a pecu- 
liar sanctity was always attached to it. This feeling, 
at that time a universal one, is most exquisitely 



1^6 god's acbe. 

expressed by Tasso, where he relates that Godfrey 
planted the Holy Standard on the ramparts of Jeru- 
salem : — 

La vincitrioe insegna in mille giri 

Alteramente si rivolge intomo : 

E par, che*n ieipiu riverente gpiri 

1/aura, e che splenda in leipiu chiaro it giomo : 

Ch'ogni dardo, ogni stral, che'n lei si tin 

la declini, o faocia indi ritomo : 

Par, che Sion, par, che I'opposto monte 

Lieto I'adori, e inchini a lei la fronte.^ 

In the middle ages no one ever passed a cross with- 
out uncovering and kneeling ; and we have a striking 
illustration of the reverence attached to this emblem 
in the stratagem that is recorded of Louis IX. of 
France. Having invited a large number of his 
knights and nobles to a banquet, he presented them 
each with a mantle, a usual gift of the season. On 
these he had secretly caused a cross of goldsmith's 



» Thus Englished by Wiffen :— 

There fixed, the conquering banner waves with pride. 
In thousand turns, majestic, o'er its side. 
And there it seems the air more gladly blows. 
And there it seems the day more brightly glows. 
And every dart or shaft which nears its fold. 
Or there declines, or thence is backward rolled : 
It seems the town, and too th' opposing height. 
Joyous inclines with reverence at the sight. 



THE CROSS. 157 

work to be embroidered, which was not noticed in 
the gloom of the chapel where they assembled to 
hear mass. On entering the brilliant banquet-hall, 
however, the circumstance was of course discovered ; 
and guileful and trickish as it certainly was, each 
knight acknowledged the obligation he had incurred 
by assuming the croaa^ and followed the king to the 
wars in the Holy Land. 

For, half a century earlier (at the council of Cler- 
mont, in Auvergne, 1095), the Pope had ordained 
this symbol — ' Let all such as are going to fight for 
Christianity put the form of a cross upon their gar- 
ments, that they may outwardly demonstrate the love 
* arising from their inward faith.' 

Probably the very earliest use of upright crosses 
as tokens of religion, was to mark the spot where 
people assembled for religious worship, or where the 
earliest preachers declared the glad tidings of salv^a- 
tion. At these, as may be supposed, mendicants were 
accustomed to station themselves to beg for alms — 
sturdy ones, doubtless, very often, as they are in these 
timea Hence the adage^ 

He begged like a cripple at across. 

The first Christian cross in Britain has been sup- 
posed to be a wooden one, erected by Oswald^ the 
tenth Saxon monarch of Northumberland, where he 



158 qod's acbe. 

offered up prayer prior to his battle with ^ the impla- 
cable Cadwalla ;' but as w6 have shown, they were 
existent in British Christian England before the 
arrival of the Saxons. 

Crosses were very anciently fixed or carved on 
monuments and gravestones. Among the laws of 
Kenneth, King of Scotland, about the year A.D. 
840, we meet with this : ' Esteem every sepulchre or 
gravestone sacred, and adorn it with the sign of the 
crosis, which take care you do not so much as 
tread on.^ 

It was in a spirit accordant with this reverence that 
they were endowed with the privilege of sanctuary. 
It was decreed by the council of Clermont, held 1093, 
that if any person should fly to a Cross on the road, 
while pursued by his enemies, he should be unmo- 
lested, as if in the church ; and by the ancient cus- 
toms of Normandy, any escaped convict taking refuge 
in a church, cemetery, or holy place, 'or by a cross 
fixed in the earthy shall be left in peace, by the privi- 
lege of the Church.' 

And so was it fitly placed on the spot where any 
singular instance of God's mercy had been shown; 
and with equal and touching appropriateness was it 
erected over against medicinal fountains, thus at once 
declaring to the imleamed and ignorant WHO gave to 
the waters their healing powers. 



THE CROSS. 159 

For oft the cross near some lone cliapel stood, 
Beside the fount, or m the public way ; 
That whoso list might there kneel down and pray 
To Him once crucified. 

And as of God's mercy, so of his judgments it was 
a fitting memorial. In other countries, Spain, or 
more especially perhaps Portugal, a cross was usually 
erected where any deed of violence had occurred. 

And here and there, as up the crags you spring, 

Mark many rude-carved crosses near the path : 
Yet deem not these devotion's offering*— 

These are memorials frail of murderous wrath : 
For wheresoe'er the shrieking victim hath 

Pour'd forth his blood beneath the assassin's knife. 
Some hand erects a cross of mouldering lath ; 

And grove and glen with thousands such are rife 
Throughout this purple land, where law secures not life. 

But the other day, as it were — that is, in 1834 — 
after the first fearful visitation of cholera, a cross was 
erected on the spot where four hundred victims had 
been interred. The poet, James Montgomery, on 
laying the first stone, said — ' In the name of God our 
Father, of Jesus Christ our only Lord and Saviour, 
and of the Holy Ghost our Guide and Comforter, I 
deposit this memorial of an awful visitation of sick- 
ness throughout this town and neighbourhood, which 
was accompanied, nevertheless, with many gracious 
manifestations of Divine merty.' 



i6o god's acre. 

At the close of the ceremony the architect said to 
him, ' I hope, sir, your work of this day will be per- 
manent.' 

He replied — 

' May it stand till the day of resurrection.' 

One of the most interesting of these memorials in 
modem days was the placing of a cross near the 
summit of Mount Ararat, in a spot where it might 
be visible from the convent below. This was erected 
in 1829 by Professor Parrot, who with a party as- 
cended with much difficulty and danger. On a 
second attempt, they gained the very summit of the 
mountain, and placed there a smaller cross. In 1834 
this cross was no longer visible, being probably irre- 
trievably buried in snow ; the larger and lower one 
was nearly covered. 

In France, and especially in Brittany, wayside 
crosses appear to have been very numerous. Indeed, 
M. Souvestre mentions the fact that an idea having 
been entertained of replacing those which had been 
destroyed in the dismal year of the Bevolution, 1793, 
it was found that it would require i,50o,cx:)0 francs 
to accomplish this object in the department of Finis- 
terre alone. A recent traveller in Brittany says that 
they are rapidly being replaced there by the zeal and 
devotion of the people. The highest ambition of a 



THE CBOSa l6l 

Bas Breton farmer seems to be to erect a huge 
granite cross, bearing his own name and that of his 
wife, with a request for the prayers of the passer-by. 
The hard and careful savings of many years, the 
writer continues, are devoted to this purpose by 
those who with difficulty earn their daily food. 

But one of the most striking and picturesque illus- 
trations of the devotional feeling of the middle agen 
is the erection of Calvaries. There are many of these 
in churchyards, especiaUy in Brittany, and some of 
them are little more than highly-decorated Crucifixes, 
with steps for kneeling ; but others are very remark- 
able, and were built usually in retired places, often 
amid the most verdant and beautiful scenes of nature. 

Their purpose has never been very exactly defined, 
but they appear to have been erections with various 
cells and little retreats for prayer and meditation, to 
which religious people made pilgrimages at stated 
seasons. 

The earliest with a date inscribed, seems to have 
been built in 1581. In the seventeenth century 
many were raised, and were often most beautifully 
carved and decorated. 

Almost every Christian city and even village, says 
the learned author of the Mores Oatholici, ^was 
adorned and consoled by some place of this kind, on 
which a Calvary was erected, where devout persons 

M 



i62, god's acre. 

went at all times to pray, and where at intervals, as 
on the festivals of the Holy Cross, in May and Sep- 
tember, the whole population would assemble in 
peaceful pilgrimage, to assist in the divine offices 
celebrated in an adjoining chapel/ 

Such was Mount Valerian, near the city of Paris, 
where from the eleventh century a succession of 
hermits had taken up their abode ; and in the year 
1695 the presbytery of St. Vit of Mont-Meillan, 
situated on the side of a hill commanding a most 
beautiful view, was converted into a calvary, with 
grottos and cells for prayer. 

Of course the most important and striking feature 
in these erections was the holy rood. M. Souvestre 
gives a representation of one at Plougastel which, on 
a richly carved foundation edifice, has innumerable 
statues representing different scenes in the life of 
our Saviour. The top is crowded with figures, and is 
surmounted by the three crosse& That bearing the 
Saviour's form has two stages ; on the lower one are 
the holy women tending the sacred corpse. The 
one thief is attended by a grimacing devil, the other 
by an angel in prayer. 

JxL.L'Univera Pittoresque is a drawing of a cal- 
vary at Landemau, with arms and projections sup- 
porting holy figures, and a basement for penitents to 
kneel ; and Mr. TroUope speaks of one at Fleyben, 



THE CROSS. J 63 

which, in bas-reliefs on the sides and entire figures 
on the top, represents our Saviour's passion, and 
many incidents of his Hfe. On the summit are not 
fewer than one hundred and twenty-two figures in 
stone, many of them on horseback. 

The Breton people are very religious : they regard 
their dead with the utmost respect and reverence, 
and are continually to be seen, men and women, 
kneeling on the cold earth in the churchyard, pray- 
ing among the graves. A recent traveller, arriving 
at a little church immediately after a funeral, found 
the churchyard full of people, many kneeling round 
the grave, 'while every one that passed (and it 
seemed that the whole village, man, woman, and 
child, were there) reverently sprinkled water three 
times on the newly-raised mound.' ^ 



^ To the same pen I am indebted for the following interesting 
anecdote, learnt (if I understand my kindly correspondent 
righUy) in conversation with M. Souvestre. 

When the cholera reached Brittany only one murmur was 
heard, and that was when, from fear of contagion, it was pro- 
posed to bury their dead in the cemeteries of remote chapels. 
The relations and friends of the dead collected round the coffin^ 
and opposed its removal from the parish churchyard, which 
already contained the bones of those whom he loved. It was 
not without danger that the orders were carried into effect. You 
should have heard their words in the long and strange dispute to 
know the depths of their hearts. 

' The remains of our fathers are buried here,' they repeated, 

H 2 



l64 60I>'S ACREL 

The penances which the discipline of the Church 
in former days imposed on offenders, were often con- 
cluded by prayer and humiliation at some specified 
cross, whence it obtained the title of ' Weeping cross.' 
Near the town of Stafford stood a cross called 
Weeping Cross, from its being a place designed for 
the expiation of penances. 

There is in Salisbury a cross of stone of very 
beautiful construction, built near the close of the 
fourteenth century by the nephew and heir of the 
then Earl of Salisbury, at the command of the 
bishop, as atonement for his heretical opinions, he 
being a Lollard. But the cost and care of erection 
was the lightest part of the penance, which ordained 
that the offender should kneel before the cross in the 
open air every Friday in the year, in the heat of 

* why separate him who is just dead P Banished down there to 
the bnrying-place of the chapel, he will hear neither the chants 
of the service nor the prayers which ransom the departed. 
Here is his place. We can see his grave from our windows. 
We can send oar smallest children every evening to pray here. 
•This earth is the property of the dead : no power can take it 
from them, or exchange it for another.' 

In vain people spoke of danger from the accumulation of 
corpses in the parish churchyard, always in the middle of 
villages, and surrounded with houses. They shook their large 
heads sadly, and their flowing hair, saying, ' Corpses do not kill 
those who are alive. Death does not come except by the will of 
Ood.' 



THE CROSS. 165 

summer or the snow of wint^, barefooted, bareheaded, 
and in only his one under-garment. 

That the cross was built, the beautiful remains, 
now converted into a poultry-market, testify ; but we 
cannot be surprised to learn that the noble culprit 
was happy to commute his personal chastisement by 
joining the wars waged by the Teutonic knights 
against the infidels. 

It was customary formerly, in carrying a corpse to 
the place of interment, always, at any cross which 
might be in the way, to rest the bier for a few mo- 
ments whilst prayer was offered up ; and it was not 
unusual to erect a cross at any spot where the bier of 
a celebrated person had been necessarily rested on its 
way to interment. Our own country was once en- 
riched by biany beautiful mementos of this kind. 
But these are mostly thrown into the shade by refer- 
ence to the magnificent crosses, twelve in number, 
erected by Edward I. to the memory of his beloved 
Queen Eleanor, at every station where her corpse 
rested on its way from Herdeley, in Lincolnshire, to 
Westminster. Of these only three remain.^ The 
one at Waltham, in Essex, was very beautifully 



^ Louis IX., King of France, died at Tunis. His body was 
brought to Paris, and thence conveyed to St. Denis. It appears to 
have been carried on men's shoulders ; and wherever, on the way 
from Paris to St. Denis, the bearers rested, crosses were erected. 



i66 god's acre. 

and correctly repaired and restored some years 
since. 

'They were to attract by their beauty, no doubt, 
but their higher purpose was to inspire the devo- 
tional sentiment : they were to call the traveller to 
remember the ^Regvnxvm boruB Tnemorice,' that he 
might there pray for her. Though without inscrip- 
tion they carried on their front the words * Orate pro 
<mvma; and accordingly they were consecrated with 
due religious solemnitiea We collect this from the 
Annals of DunetablCy where it is said that when the 
chancellor and other persons had marked out the 
spot on which the cross was to be erected, the prior 
of Dunstable sprinkled the ground with holy water. 
By being placed by the highway side, the greater 
number of persons would see them, and be engaged 
to be mindful of the dead.' 

It seems difficult now to picture 'a stately cross 
of stone' in the centre of the overwhelmingly crowded 
Cheapside. There it was however. A magnificent 
structure, according to Stow, surrounded with large 
emblematic figures richly gilded. The same accurate 
chronicler records the regilding of these figures on 
various important occasions, as against the coming 
of the Emperor Charles V. ; for the coronation 
of Edward YL ; again for the coronation of Queen 
Mary, and afterwards on the coming of King Philip. 



THE CBOSS. 167 

But heavy complaints had arisen against it by this 
time, as the city became more and more populous, 
on the very reasonable ground of the great hindrance 
to traffic, the inconvenient interruption of the 
thoroughfare. 

No redress however could be obtained on this 
ground: but as the Reformation progressed, the 
citizens, feeling their consciences offended by the 
emblematical figures, took the remedy into their own 
hands, and in 158 1 half demolished the structure. 
It would be tedious to follow its mutations in detail ; 
sometimes repaired by order of council, as often pil- 
laged and shattered by the will of the populace. In 
the reign of King James I. it was repaired and 
beautified for the last time, and in 1643 ^^ ^^ 
completely demolished. 

The same desolating period witnessed also the utter 
destruction of the cross at Charing, the last stage 
where the remains of the loved and honoured queen 
were rested, before she was placed for ever in the 
royal cemetery over against the stately home where 
she had so long presided. 

It seemed as if the influence of the neighbourhood 
which she had illustrated by her royalty, adorned by 
her abode, and elevated by her virtue, might have 
stimulated even the architects who designed and 
executed this work — this beautiful memento of one 



1 68 qod's acre, 

whose gentle and domestic virtues shed a lialo of 
softening and refining beauty on tlie gorgeous details 
of royal life. No * emblematical figures/ gilded and 
adorned, as on the showily emblazoned cross at 
Cheapside, attracted the gaze of the careless pas- 
senger. The memorial of Hhe Good Queen' at 
Charing was infinitely more expensive than any 
other — ^but the cost was that of material and work- 
manship, not of glittering device. It was a cross of 
pure white marble, approached by a lofty flight of 
steps of the same spotless substance. 

But with regard to wayside crosses, the reason 
given in many old writers for their erection seems as 
tenable as beautiful — namely, to ' guide and guard 
the way to the church/ A writer in the Archoea- 
logical Journal affirms that many of these crosses 
still answer this, their original purpose. In several 
parishes there are 'church paths' kept- up, along 
which still remain crosses, or portions of them, all 
pointing towards the church. In some cases where 
the path is quite lost, crosses still remain — ^not facing 
the west,^ as is the invariable rule regarding church 
crosses^ but pointing and guiding in the direction of 
the church. As to the allegation, concludes this 



^ ' It is supposed that on the cross His face was directed to 
the west, and therefore we pray turned to the east, that we may 
behold the face of Christ.' — See chap. xvi« 



THE CROSS. 169 

writer, that they guard the way to the church, there 
can be little doubt that in those early, and it may be 
'superstitious' times, such was regarded to be the 
efficacy of the holy sign. 

Whilst transcribing these notes I read for the 
first time the poem from which the following lines 
are taken : — 

Say, was it to my Spirit's gain or loss, 
One bright and balmy morning as I went 
From Li^'s lonely environs to Ghent, 

If hard by the way-side I found a cross, 

That made me breathe a pray'r upon the spot — 
While Nature of herself, as if to trace 
The emblem's use, had trail'd around its base 

The blue significant Forget-me-not P 

Methought, the claims of Charity to urge 
More forcibly, along with Faith and Hope, 

The pious choice had pitched upon the verge 
Of a delicious slope. 
Giving the eye much variegated scope ;— - 

' Look round,' it whisper'd, ' on that prospect rare, 
Those vales so verdant, and those hills so blue ; 

Enjoy the sunny world, so fresh and fair, 
But' — (how the simple legend pierced me thro' I) 
'Pbiez foub les Malheubbuz.' 



CHAPTER VIII. 

TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 

Parian le tombe ove la storia h muta. 
Mouuments themselves must die. 

TT were diflScult, perhaps impossible, to select a 
-■- more appropriate site whereon to weave a few 
very brief remarks on the varying fashions of tombs 
than Westminster Abbey, a royal minster and burial- 
place of kings far too intimately as well as generally 
known, and far too often and too well described, for 
much to be gathered by my rambling and superficial 
pen. This gorgeous cemetery is referred to here but 
as an encyclopaedia for the curious in tombs — 

Where princes and old bishops sleep, 

With sceptre and with crook. 
And mighty spirits haunt around 

Each Gothic shrine and nook. 

There are three dim tombs in Westminster Abbey, 
if indeed they do yet remain, of which all memory 
will soon be effaced. Twenty years ago, when, a 
stranger, I first explored the recesses of the cloisters, it 
was with diflSculty I could decipher the names Vitalia 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 17I 

Abbds, 10821; Oislebertus AhbaSy and Laurenti/us 
Abbas, 1170 : — 

Old monimente, which of so famous sprights 
The honour, yet in ashes, did maintain. 

If the cloisters be as much the resort of jocund 
schoolboys, careless nursery-maids, and romping chil- 
dren as they then were, probably by this time the then 
nearly defaced characters have quite disappeared. 
Desecration and the mutations of time will have 
wrought their usual effects, and these tombs, once 
conspicuously and richly adorned, be now on an un- 
distinguished level with the pavement According to 
the ritual of the ancient Church, on the anniversaries 
of the deaths of great and holy men, a requiem used 
to be added to the vesper service ; and that of Abbot 
Vitalis was especially so commemorated. Then, this 
now defaced and desecrated tomb was covered with 
golden-wrought silk, and waxen tapers burned around, 
glancing on many a rich ornament and decorated 
shrine ; then the pealing organ rolled its lofty tones 
far and wide through the dim and solemn recesses of 
the church, whilst the religious brotherhood chanted 
a holy requiem for ' peace to the soule ' of him who 
slept below. 

How strangely different must this abbey have 
looked formerly, when entirely appropriated to the 
solemn devotional purposes for which it was originally 



1 7a god's acre. 

intended ; When its now desecrated shrines were duly 
honoured, its now dusty tabernacles most duly puri- 
fied, and when its every portal stood opened wide to 
induce the entrance of the careless passer-by, or faci- 
litate the participation of the contrite worshipper in 
the prayers and praises which daily and hourly testi- 
fied to the belief of a God on the earth. 

Now, it is regarded by the many — ^is it not ? — 
chiefly as a show-place, the great sculpture-gallery 
of London : it has been called ' A Statuabt's 
Yard.' 

'All at once,' says a modem highly esteemed 
writer, ' the vijsitor is ushered into what seems a 
public room of exhibition of art in the utmost con- 
fusion, or the slatternly studio of a statuary of the 
most ordinary attainments : figures upright, sitting, 
naked, impudently stare upon him, and perhaps, in 
very suitable accordance with the creed of some whom 
they represent, seem by their posture to assert that 
the resurrection is past already.' 

But the whole abbey, excepting the chancel, is now 
one great exhibition of monuments. 

And many of them so startling and so unsightly ! 
wanting merely the adjunct of colour to beguile you 
into the idea that you have a heterogeneous multitude 
of people moving around you, rather than into a 
reverent impression of the dead waiting in darkness 




TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 173 

and dlehce below. These figures in the attitudes of 
life and action — aye, of energetic action and stalwart 
life — ^are most admirably calculated doubtless to 
display the sculptor s skill ; but are they fit emblems 
of that, dust which the Almighty vivified, now re*^ 
solved to dust again, to be placed in the very house 
dedicated to His worship, and where we are taught 
to believe His eye more especially dwells ? 

Our forefathers showed a better taste and a more 
humble and religious spirit in these matters, when 
they laid the stone sculpture or the brazen effigy 
recumbent^ the eyes closed, and the hands folded, as 
if in prayer. 

The earliest form of Christian monument, so far 
as we learn from those remains, was merely the lid 
of a stone coffin, flat, coped, or ridge-shaped in the 
centre, and which in early times often formed part of 
the pavement itself. Very soon a cross was carved 
on the stone, or a religious emblem, or some symbol 
of the profession of the deceased. Then came the 
effigy of the dead person carved on the stone, or a 
representation of the coffin opened, with the figure 
displayed wholly or in part within. 

By degrees the tombs were raised higher and 
higher above the pavement, and when constructed 
for a person of high rank or consideration were sur- 
mounted by a Testoon. or Canopy ; and as in the 



174 qod's acbe. 

progress of magnificence these became arched and 
elevated, they were found too cumbersome in the 
church ; and chapels^ opening from side-aisles, were 
erected for them; or they were sometimes at the 
east end, running parallel with the chancel. Some of 
these altar tombs exhibit a beautiful and most appro- 
priate union of sculpture and architecture. 

Some of these, especially the large altar monu- 
ments, were adorned with the richest brasses, and 
with gems and precious stones; some had whole life- 
like figures of brass. That of Henry III. is the first 
on record, and bears testimony to the improved state 
of the arts at that period It was this monarch who 
provided a coffin of pure gold and precious stones 
(of which it is said the cost of the workmanship 
exceeded even that of the material) for the remains of 
Edward the Confessor. 

There were two figures of brass appropriated to 
Queen Eleanor, the daughter-in-law of Henry III., 
one at Westminster, the other at Lincoln. Before 
this time statues were only wooden figures plated 
over with bronze or copper, plain or gilt 

Some monumental effigies were of silver, as that of 
Catherine, daughter of Henry III., who died in j 257, 
and that of Gilbert Clare, first Earl of Gloucester ; 
and to the hero Henry V. was raised, in Westminster 
also, by Katharine of France, his queen, one of silver 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 1 75 

plate gilded. The head itself^ being of massiye silver, 
was soon stolen. 

But these, however rich, costly, and gorgeous, 
maintained the humble and deprecatory attitude to 
which we have alluded, and which was adopted by 
persons of both sexes and of all ranks, though not 
without some emblematic differences. As, for in- 
stance, the crossing the legs of crusaders, or even 
of those who had taken the vows but had been pre- 
vented from going to the Holy Land ; the frequent 
elevation of the right hand of prelates, as if in bene- 
diction. Prelates had their mitres, crosiers, or great 
cross — ^bishops bearing the crosier in their left hand, 
abbots in their right Less dignified priests bore a 
chalice. Warriors had their arms, kings their crowns; 
kings and prelates also were represented in gloves — 
kings usually being buried in gloves of fine lineu. 
Warriors wore gauntlets. Officers of State and other 
noblemen are represented with a glove on the right 
hand for the purpose of supporting a hawk, while 
the other is off and held in the left hand. Some 
prelates have the hands simply crossed in a pray- 
ing attitude, and others hold a pastoral staff or a 
book. 

There were also various other emblems, ill imder- 
stood now, and too numerous to recapitulate. Of 
such were lions at the feet of effigies, typifying vigi- 



176 gob's ACER 

lance^ industry, and courage. Such the human 
heads under the feet of one of the figures in the 
Temple Church, alluding to infidels slain in the Cm- 
sadea Such the dragons under the feet pierced by 
the staves of the abbots of Peterborough, and also of 
an old bishop of Salisbury, expressive of the triumphs 
of Christianity over the devil ; and sometimes an 
escalop shell would be engraven under the cross flor^, 
to denote that the occupant of the tomb had in life- 
time performed a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James 
«t Compostella.^ The phoenix is a very ancient 
emblem ; so is the crown. The dolphin is often repre- 
sented on tombs, because that fish is reputed the 
friend of man. Moreover, it was believed that the 
body of St Lucien was drawn from the waves by a 
dolphin, and carried to the place of burial. 
. It was a sad innovation on good taste in tombs the 
fashion of representing on them a skeleton, or worse 



^ A coBtom derived probably from tbe classical nations, for we 
read that the Athenians placed a piece of ship-plank on the graves 
of persons who died abroad or in exile. On the tomb of Archi- 
medes were a sphere and a cylinder, on that of Diogenes a dog, 
Sui. &c. 

On the tomb of a prior of Norwich, who died 1480, was the 
conceited device of three skulls : the first had teeth, to signify 
youth ; the second had teeth only in the lower jaw, to signify 
advanced age ; and the third was without any teeth at all, to 
represent old age. 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 177 

still, the corpse in a state of corruption. This seems 
to have been first noticed in the fifteenth century, 
and it appears that in almost all the cathedral and 
conventual churches throughout England there is 
one, and scarcely more than one, representation of a 
skeleton lying either under or on a table-tomb. Na 
wonder that such revolting exhibitions were not greatly 
multiplied. ' Far more usual, and far more becoming, 
were the effigies of corpses enveloped in shrouds 
tied at the head and feet. This, too, was the most 
usual style at that period of effigies in brass, though a 
skeleton in brass is named by Stothard of as early 
a date as 1542. The well-wrought skeletoniS on the 
tombs of Bishops Fox and Gardiner at Winchester, 
Chichel^ at Canterbury, and Dean Colet's, which 
existed, remained rather, no very long time since, in 
the vaults of St. Paul's Cathedral, have been the 
most remarked in England. 

There is one of a Due de Croye, in a church near 
Louvaine, where the skeleton is represented with the 
worms preying on it ; and I have read of another 
at Qisors still more revoltingly depicted. The me- 
morials of the dea^ may rightly be constructed so as 
to awaken awe, but surely not to excite horror ! 

Skeletons, however, were not formerly depicted as 
emblems but as contrasts. The ancients never repre- 
sented Death on their monuments. The most flaring 

N 



178 god's acbe. 

and revolting personification in tbis, or I should 
think in any other country^ is the celebrated Nightin- 
gale monument. 

St. Charles Borromeo ordered a painter to sub- 
stitute the golden key of Paradise for the skeleton 
and scjrthe by which an artist had represented Death. 

I have read that, in the Temple of Juno at Eli% 
Sleep and his twin-brother Death were represented 
as children, reposing in the arms of Night. This is 
poetical and beautiful. Why should death be made 
a terror, to young children at any rate! On various 
ancient funeral monuments Death is perscmified as a 
beautiful youth, his wings folded and his feet crossed^ 
leaning on an inverted torch in the attitude of repose. 
This is a poetical idea, but its pagan originators had 
not our blessed certainty that the torch is not ex- 
tmgwiehed. 

Yery beautiful, too, and Christian, is that e£Gigy 
representing a figure with extended wings ascending^ 
and holding, with outstretched hands, the zings and 
links of a broken chain. Mistily and dimly seen 
below is a globe, this lower earth, from which the 
freed spirit has escaped, and having broken the chain 
that bound her, is soaring upward. 

It does seem, I think, a strange, a most material 
fasicyy to personify the soul. In France, from the 
twelfidi to the sixteenth century, there are many 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHa 179 

monuments, especially of Religioudy where the soul is 
conveyed in a sheet by angels to heaven. In Eng- 
land it is not unfrequently represented as borne by 
angels from the head of effigies, as on the monument 
of Aymer de Valence, 1308, and of Lord Burghersh 
in the same century. It is also seen on the brass of 
Sir Hugh Hastings, at Elsying at Norfolk, and on 
one in All Hallows Church, Newcastle But it is 
^ traced to its utmost state,' as Qough says, in the 
monument of Lady Percy, where it is 'seated in the 
bosom of the Father, the angels harping on their 
harps around/ 

In a church at Axminster is a monument where a 
lady holds between her hands a figure like a little 
doll, swathed in a close garment, with its hands 
uplifted. This is supposed to represent her souL In 
the church of Hitchenden, near High Wycombe, in 
Buckinghamshire, is an altar-tomb of the sixteenth 
century, without inscription, representing a man in 
his shroud, and on his open breast a little figure with 
hands elevated, representing his souL 

I have seen an engraving from a picture by 
Lorenzo Sabbatini. of Bologna, representing the Holy 
Family and St. John. The Archangel Michael is 
standing near with one foot firmly planted on Satan, 
pictured as the great Serpent. He holds in his hands 
scales, from which he is presenting souls to the infant 



i8o god's acrk 

Christ. The soul then in the scale is a little naked 
doll. 

Ca/a anything be more puerile, more prosaic ? 

Westminster Abbey has the privilege of enshrining 
the Idsft recumbent monumental figure ;^ that erected 
in 1675 to the memory of William Cavendish, Duke 
of Newcastle, 

This still and solemn repose of the figure — this 
meek uplifting of the hands as if the last moment of 
existence were spent in imploring the mercy so soon 
to be needed — this solemn reverent position, so 
marked in those Christian tombs of heretofore — ^is 
surely the due and fitting testimony not merely to 
the solemnity of the fact commemorated, but to the 
place where its memorial is enshrined: for, as was 
said in early Christian times, and as all Christians 
profess to believe, * The church is a place of angels, 
a place of archangels, a palace of God.' Yet into 
these solemn assemblies of angels, passing and repass- 
ing on all sides around, and where innumerable hosts 
below are waiting the dread summons to arise, we 



' The last of former days. In our age the same feeling and 
spirit have been practically and beautifully illustrated in the 
monument ndsed at St. Albans by the sculptor Bacon to the 
memory of his daughter. On the canopy which shades the 
reoumbent priaying form is inscribed — 'I believe in the communion 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. l8l 

intrude naked atliletaB in attitudes of daring bravado^ 
or figures in gorgeous costume with flaring accomr 
paniments, trumpeting to all comers of the earth the 
praises of one whom we hope to be ' a contrite sinner/ 
The meditative figure of Watt, with his compasses 
and paper, as if planning some improvement in 
machinery — or of Wordsworth contemplatively 
lounging (how pure and holy soever we may suppose 
his meditations to be) — are innovations more than 
enough on the reverence due to the temple of the 
Uving God, not originally meant for a sculpture-haU. 

To other pens we leave it, as beyond the scope of 
this book, to trace historically the gradual change in 
monuments and effigies from the figure recumbent 
and solemn, to that in easy repose ; then to one in a 
kneeling attitude, with troops of little children (' after 
the Reformation^ kneeling also ;^ then the life-like 



^ I remember to have seen some monuments of the Yemon 
family in Bakewell Church, where these figures, strongly thrown 
out and most gorgeously coloured, ' small by degrees and beau- 
tifully less,' decline from the paterfamilias through troops of sons 
on the one hand, from the mother through a goodly array of 
daughters on the other. Though the costume and custom of 
those days, it does seem ludicrous to us to see the little men and 
women, even to ' the baby,' attired precisely as are its father and 
mother, even to coifs and farthingales, wigs and knee-buckles. 
Among the brasses engraven in Mr. Stothard's Monumental 
Effigies is one where seven children stand on small pedestals 



' >i. 1 ' . » t » ■■ 1 O n * ■* " .»— ^^-W^ 



iSji god's acbb. 

stalwart man, displaying every perfection of muscle 
and sinew, energy and health — ^health and vigour 
that appear to laugh sickness and decay to scorn. 

To other and more qualified pens also leave we 
the task of depicting the barbarous application of 
classical emblems to Christian tombs ; to explain, if 
they can, why — if it be true, as we suppose, that even 
the angels of Our Father do watch with holy re- 
joicing the death of a righteous man — ' why angels 
should take this form of little boys, and why they 
should lament so deeply for the transition of a good 
man from earth to heaven/^ 

With various other anomalies. 

Hardly stranger, though of so very opposite a 
character, is the contrast between Westminster Abbey 
now and in former days, than the contrast between it 
and another abbey which these references to prelatial 
tombs brought to my mind, but which, less happy, 



beneath their parents' feet, each little figure being a duodecimo 
republication of the parental one above. It is hardly possible to 
repress a smile. 

* The writer alludes, of course, to the very common represen- 
tation of cherubs weeping. But at Chenies, in Buckingham- 
shire, on a monument of the Bedford family, cherubim are repre- 
sented holding aloft the armorial bearings of that noble house, 
almost as if they would give them a lift into heaven with the 
family. 



^•mi»'^0* 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 1 83 

sank entirely beneath the blow which did but para- 
lyse that. Westminster Abbey, though shorn of its 
ancient pomp^ is still in active existence, and is daily 
open for the due celebration of the sacred services of 
the Church ; but Tintem Abbey is lost in desolation. 
Less wantonly desecrated now than some other ruined 
shrines (for its noble proprietor is scrupulous in his 
care), it is yet a shattered heap of walls entirely 
roofless. I was told that a computation had been 
made of the cost necessary for its restoration, but that 
it was supposed half a million of money could not 
repair the devastation caused by iconoclastic ravages 
and subsequent neglect 

Could we borrow Prince Houssain's carpet, or some 
more modem vehicle of speed — railways are too 
tortoise-like — ^and transport ourselves in no ti/me^ 
as the saying is, from one abbey to the other, the 
contrast would indeed be a strange one. Emerging 
with some difficulty from the jammed choir of the 
royal abbey ; passing direct from its porch into the 
bustle, the turmoil, and the never-ceasing whirl of 
London life in its busiest phase and most crowded 
quarter, and, mingled with the busy hum of rattling 
cabs and rolling omnibuses, and all other adjuncts of 
the world in a hurry, to hear the muttered discontent of 
your fellow-worshippers of the length of the anthem, 
or the stupidity of the preacher, or the inconvenient 



184 god's acre. 

crowd in the chancel — and then in one minute (Prince 
Houssain's carpet took hardly that) to find yourself 
amid the venerable and peaceful shades of Tintem 
Abbey. A contrast indeed ! 

So applicable are the following descriptive lines to 
this beautiful ruin that they might have been written 
with express reference to it : — 

Aronnd the very place doth brood 
A strange and holy quietude. 
Where lingers long the evening gleam. 
And stilly sounds the mountain stream. 

I know not if it is the scene, 
Bosom'd in hills by the ravine ; 
Or if it is the conscious nund 
Hallows the spot and stills the wind. 
And makes the very place to know 
The peace of them that sleep below. 
Investing Nature with the spell 
Of that strange calm unspeakable. < 

Methinks that both together blend ' 

To hallow their calm peaceful end, — 
The thoughts of them that slumber there 
Seem still to haunt the holy ground ; 
And e'en the spot and solemn air 
Themselves partake that calm profound. 

Methinks that He who oft at even f 

Brings stillness o'er the earth and heaven, < 

Till mountains, skies, and neighbouring sea 
Blend in one solemn harmony. 
Hath caused e'en Nature's self to grace 
This sweet and holy resting-place. 



m ■ m i wiiw^w^ 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 185 

The fame of this beautiful ruin, as a ruin, has been 
spread far and wide, and the few memorials of its his- 
tory are probably well known — that is to say, its erec- 
tion early in the twelfth century by Walter de Clare, 
* for the good of his soul and the souls of his kins- 
men,' and its destruction in the reign of Henly VIII. 
Of its intermediate history there are few records.^ 

^ One of the very few Chatewux eihEspagne which, in an 
nnprosperous life, I have ventured to erect, was a visit to Tintem 
Abhej; and this wish was most nnexpectedly and suddenly 
realized. The castle in air became a substantial reality on earth. 
I spent three happy days in the little inn which almost touches 
the ruins of Tintem. 

Having gone over these ruins in due form with the guide, and 
propitiated his goodwill by a flattering attention to all his sur- 
mises, theories, and opinions, I obtained permission to pay an- 
other visit there alone ; and accordingly I repaired thither about 
half-past five in the bright and glorious afternoon of the follow- 
ing day. He ushered me in, and very politely lamented the 
necessity for locking me up, but he dai*ed not leave the door 
open. As, however, he gave me a thin long pole wherewith to 
touch the gong when I was tired, I was quite contented that so 
\i should be. I wished to take an outline of the east and west 
windows, in order to convince my husband that he was wrong in 
a slight argument we had held at our dinner. My sketch, how- 
ever, had a less happy result, for it decidedly condemned myself; 
and most truly did I sympathise in the pathetic apostrophe of 
my old friend Dogberry — * that I should be here to write me 
down — an ass !' And with my own pencil too ! — a cruel aggra- 
vation of the blunder — a sort of adding 'insult to injury!' 
And I was so sure to be unmercifully quizzed on my return. 



1 86 god's acre. 

The tombstones, level with the pavement, being, 
not improbably, the very lids of the coffins, are long 
and very narrow, narrowing considerably at the foot, 



Also I wanted to re-examine the tombs and other remains 
without being hurried, or fancying myself so, by the officious 
attendance of the guide. 

Having completed my sketches, finished my examination of 
the ruins, and wandered about until I felt tired, I sat down near 
the shattered tomb of Strongbowe, on a fragment of stone raised 
above the grassy flooring, and took a still more leisurely survey 
of the limely graves scattered around me. The river gushed on 
with a solemn murmur, the bright clear sky overhead (for the 
whole building was roofless) gradually assumed a graver tinge, 
and here and there a star began faintly to twinkle ; the jack- 
daws, which have congregated here in myriads for centuries, 
b^^ to be less noisy in their demonstrations ; and the soimds 
of active life outside the ruin, which had heretofore occasionally 
broken the silence, entirely ceased. I could almost fancy I saw 
the solemn shadow of the hills failing around. 

My eye fell on the burial-place of Willifried, once abbot of this 
magnificent structure, as the crook on his gravestone testifies ; 
thence glanced across to that of William Wilmot, who died 
A.D. 1480, having been promoted to this abbacy from a her- 
mitage. 

Such I remembered was the case with several of the arch- 
bishops of that gorgeous cathedral — ^Canterbury. And thence I 
fell to ruminating on its tombs and shrines as I had last seen 
them, and I could not help contrasting the lowly graves of 
Abbots Willifried and Wilmot with that of St. Thomas aBecket 
in his own cathedral, Canterbury, as it was — ^long ago. I 
teas contrasting the turf-bordered, the pure, and green, and besn- 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 187 

SO as to approach that triangular shape which we are 
told was the very first adopted. On the south side of 

tiful, the fragile bat ever-renovating garniture of these tombs 

—the 

Verdant mantle of decay 

which enshrouds them, with the gorgeous jewellery, the rich 
gems, the egg-sized diamond (so says Erasmus), which decorated 
the sumptuous shrine at Canterbury-^-at least I think I was 
doing all this — when I was shaken from head to foot by a tre- 
mendous sneeze. I don't like even a moderate sneeze— but this 
was too bad. 

Up, instantaneously, up rose the daws in myriads. The sky 
was blackened with them. I had sat quiet and motionless so 
long that I fancy they had begun to regard me as a fixture, 
when my most sudden and unceremonious stercoration admo- 
nished them of their mistake. The clamour was tremendous : 
they swept round, and round, and round, making an intense 
uproar, which my most hearty laugh, almost as involuntary as 
my sneeze, seemed rather to aggravate than appease. 

After I had recovered my equanimity and the full use of my 
limbs, which were really rather cramped by the evening air or 
something else, I searched for the pole, and through the fast 
gathering darkness groped my way to the western door, to 
touch the gong which hung there. I had scarcely reached 
it when the door was hurriedly thrown open, and the guide 
rushed in with ten thousand apologies — 'He had really quite 
forgotten me.' 

I did not tQll him that I had really quite forgotten myself. 

* Pray make no apologies : I have felt no wish to leave' {that 
was true). * I was just about to touch the bell' {that was true 
also). * But pray, as you did forget me, what reminded you of 
meP' 



1 88 ood's acbe. 

the nave are two tombs side by side ; on one the 

inscription — 

Sic jacet Johannes Kere, 

And on the other simply the words — 

Alicia Kere, 

But on the woman's is engraven a heart 





' The jackdaws, ma'am, rose up in a cloud as if something had 
starded them, screaming loud enough to waken the dead.' 

I kept my own counsel. 

' They roused me, ma'am, just as I was preparing for hed ; and 
I remembered you, and came that instant. I fear you have rung 
the bell and I not heard you.' 

' No, indeed, I have not rung at all, and you are in exceedingly 
good time.' 

We parted, this intelligent and gentlemanlike guide and I, 
with mutual expressions of goodwill ; and I promised him (and 
mi/self) to return to Tintem in the autumn. It was otherwise 
ordained. The close of that autumn saw me fixed in a most 
unpropitious locality, one hundred and fifty miles away : the dose 
of that autumn saw him in his quiet grave. 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 189 

It is the only memento of the interment of a 
female which has been found in the ruins, and might 
in itself form the nucleus of a little romance, if there 
were one collateral circumstance to serve as an 
illustration, or even as a peg on which to hang a 
conjecture. But there is not 

Gough relates an anecdote from Matthew Paris of 
a privilege to be buried before the high altax granted 
to Cecily Sandford, a lady of condition, relict of 
William Gosham. She made a vow of perpetual 
widowhood, and assumed the russet habit and ring, 
the usual token of such a resolution. As she was 
exjiring, her confessor desired her attendant to 
remove a gold ring from her finger, which she rallied 
sufficiently to prevent, saying that she intended to 
carry it to heaven, in testimony of her constant 
observance of her vow. All this being attested by 
her confessor, she was honourably interred in St. 
Alban's Abbey Church, in a stone coffin, before the 
altar of St Andrew, on account of her vow and her 
rank. 

Bather the lady's rank and influence than her 
vow, for many were the similar vows made formerly, 
and religiously kept, without the devotees fancying 
themselves entitled to peculiar honours in sepulture. 

I quote an instance or two of this form of vow, as 
illustrative of the actual life of former timea 



190 god's acbe. 

A Countess of Suffolk, in 1382, made such a vow 
in presence of the Bishops of Ely and Norwich, 
the Earl of Warwick, Lords Willoughby and Scales, 
many knights, and a large assembly of persona The 
precise words as given in the register of Fordham are 
quoted in the Sepulchral Monuments : — 

' Jeo Isabella jadys la femme William de Ufforde 
count de Suff. vowe a Dieu & a notre dame Seynte 
Marie & a toux seyntz in presence de tres reverentz 
piers en Dieu evesq : de Ely & de Norwiz qe jeo doi 
estre chast d'ors en avaunt ma vie duranta' 

The vow was duly received and recorded, and then 
a mantle and ring having been solemnly blessed by the 
prelate, the lady was indued therewith, it being cus- 
tomary to present a mantle and ring to all those who 
took upon themselves a vow of chastity. 

Philippa^ daughter of Henry Lord Ferrers of 
Qroby, who married Guy Earl of Warwick, in the 
reign of Edward III., and became a widow, resolved 
to continue so during her life. She made her solemn 
vow of chastity on the nth of August, 1360, in the 
collegiate church at Warwick, in the presence of 
Reginald Bryan, Bishop of Worcester, in these 
words : — 

*En le nom de la Seint Trinitie, Pifere, Fil & 
Seint Espirit, jeo Philippe que fu la feme Sire Guy 
de Warwiste face purement e des queer & voluntee 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. * I9I 

enti^rement, avowe a Dieu & Seint Eglise e a la 
benure Virgin Marie, & a toute le bel compaigne 
celestine, & a vous reverent Pi&re en Dieu Sire 
Reynaud per le grace de Dieu Evesque de Wircestre, 
que jeo ameneray ma vie en chastite^ defore en 
avant ; & chaste serra de mon corps a tout temps de 
ma vie/ 
And all were very similar. 

The chief proportion of the tombstones in Tin- 
tern^ which have been exhumed from the soil 
which centuries had accumulated on them, appear 
to be the tombs of abbots of the monastery, aa 
indicated by the pastoral stafi^ or abbatial crook, 
carved down the centre of the stone. Bound the 
margins are engraven names and dates, or em- 
blematical devices, or sentences of deprecation or 
supplication. One in the south transept exhibits 
the broken sentences — 

Jekktn ap Howell. 

It was the custom to place some such brief depre- 
cation on tombs, whether merely engraven or inlaid 



* Within the church, I mean, not m the doistered ce- 
metery. ' 



192 * god's aceb. 

with molten lead or brass, the latter often richly 

enamelled — 

Miserere met Jesus. 

Jhu, fili David, miserere nobis. 

On whose soules Jesu have vCcy, 

Libera nos, salve nos, jtutifica nos, beata Trinitas, 

And numberless other sach ; and it was very usual to 
carve the figures of abbots, bishops, knights, on the 
very stone which served as a lid to the coffin. And 
here, in Tintem, these pathetic and deprecatory 
apostrophes lost none of their effect by the unseemly 
arrangement so often to be noticed on mourning 
tablets, when the 'labels,' as they are technically 
called, proceed from the mouths of inflated cherubs, 
or, worse still, issue in winding streamers, like yards 
of ribbon from a draper's shop, from lips supposed to 
be engaged in prayer. But these are merely the 
innovations of bad taste on a custom beautifully and 
truthfully appropriate. How far more suitable than 
modem vaunting epitaph is such humble and prayer- 
ful ejaculation as 

Illi Dei miserere mei I 

Jhu, mercy I 

Dei Deus requiem que per semper permanet, 

Jhu, for thi grete pety ofou/r synnes have mercy. 

These and other such were the inscriptions formerly 
universal on tombs. 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHa 193 

On the tomb of Edward the Black Prince, in 
Canterbury Cathedral, there are merely the names 
of the reigning sire and the royal son, who died on 
the Feast of the Trinity, in the year of grace 1376 — 
* To the 8(yid of whom, Ood grant mercy. Amen.* 

In the Norman times it was the custom to bury 
monks in the bare ground. Abbot Warin of St. 
Albans, who died A.D. 11 95, ordered that they should 
be buried in stone coffins, as more decent. But, with 
perhaps this exception, the former custom prevailed 
for long after ; and in the time of Edward II. and 
Edward IIL even persons of distinction preferred to 
have their bodies committed to the earth rather with- 
out the stone coffin than with it. 

These stone coffins were, as we have said, triangu- 
lar, and in many of them was a circular space to 
receive the head. It is probable, says M. de Cau- 
mont, that certain Abbeys abroad^ had magasina of 
stone coffins, where the friends who bore the dead to 
the cemetery might make their choice. This manu- 
facture of coffins was an industries a commerce 
more or less lucrative for such religious establish- 
ments and churches as possessed the privilege. 

At that period, continues this writer, each parish 



' C(n»ri cT Antiquity Monumentales, torn. vL chap. 3. 

O 



JQ4 god's acre. 

had not, as now, power to inter their dead near their 
own church : neither could they baptize in all, but 
only in certain churches. The churches where they 
baptized were also those where they had their 
cemeteries. 

Anciently they had, in many places, to carry their 
dead some leagues, and assuredly could not do so in 
heavy stone coffina The monastery of St. Savin, in 
the Pyrennees, was celebrated as a place of baptism 
and burial; all the parishes in the surrounding vallqr, 
more than sixty in number, being compelled to resort 
thither for these holy ofiBces. 

When labourers were at work in the choir of 
Gloucester in 1741, during the 'ransacking,' as it is 
called, of that cathedral, they found in the passage 
three abbots, buried near the surface of the ground, 
in pontificaMbuSy part of their gloves and apparel 
remaining. Several ancient Bishops of London were 
so found, lying in their proper habits. 

Dr. Bathurst, Dean of Wells> and President of 
Trinity College, Oxford, who died so lately as 1 704, 
directed that there should be no lid to his coffin, but 
only a black pall of wooUen stuff loosely hanging 
over it 

For poor people the disuse of coffins long prevailed ; 
indeed it was quite the custom in Queen Elizabeth's 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 1 95 

reign to buiy only in winding-sheets in the ground. 
There were recently to be seen, both at St Albans 
and at Durham, the chests with lid and hinges which 
were formerly used as biers to convey those dead to 
the grave who had no coffin but their winding-sheets* 
Far later than this the custom was continued 
in the princely house of St. Clair ; in fact, was not 
discontinued until the reign of James II., when 
a St Clair was first buried in a coffin. The usage of 
interring the knights of this noble family in their 
armour, and without coffin, is thus beautifully referred 
to by Sir Walter Scott : — 

O'er Boslin all that dreary night 
A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam ; 

'Twas broader than the watchfire light. 
And redder than the bright moonbeam. 

It glared on Eoslin's castled rock. 
It ruddied all the copsewood glen ; 

'Twas seen (rom Drjden's groves of oak. 
And seen from cavemed Hawthomden. 

Seemed all on fire that chapel proud. 
Where Hoslin's chiefs uncoffined lie ; 

Each haron,for a sable shroud, 
Sheoithed in his iron panoply. 

Seemed all on fire within, around. 

Deep sacristy and altar's paU; 
Shone every pillar foliage-bound. 

And glimmered all the dead men's mail. 

Coffins were, however, used at a very much earlier 



tg6 qod's acbk 

period than that to which we have been chiefly 
referring. The very earliest of all in England seem 
to have been the trunks of trees, hollowed. King 
Arthur's coffin is said by some to have been the 
entire trunk of an oak ; by others of an alder. If this 
be true, the length of his coffin may be accounted for, 
without attributing to the British hero the very 
extreme height with which romance has invested 
him. To Guthlac, the far-famed hermit of the island 
(it was then an island) of Croyland, situated among 
the marshes and fens of Lincolnshire, over whose 
grave King Ethelred erected the celebrated abbey — 
to Guthlac, Eadburga, Abbess of Repton, in the 
county of Derby, sent a gift of a leaden coffin 
(aarcophagum pluTjfibeuTn). It is true that she lived 
amid some of the principal and perhaps oldest lead 
mines in the kingdom. It may not be unfair to 
draw the. inference that coffins were usually manu- 
factured of such material as circumstances might 
render most available. 

It is impossible to enlarge on modem monumental 
inscriptions. The subject is endless. 

Wordsworth wrote a prose essay, perhaps even 
more elaborate <than his poetry, on the proper con- 
struction of an epitaph; but Mr. Markland has 
given the most true and just criticism on the folly, 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. I97 

profanity, and ignorance of the mass of modern epi- 
taphs, and the best suggestions for reforming this evil. 
As in tombs themselves, so in inscriptions having 
personal reference to the departed, there was formerly 
a humility and reverence lost sight of in these days — 
as thus : — 

Obiit Adelelmus, nobilis miles, et humilis. 

Or an older one — 

Obiit GoMdus, clarus consilio, amicus pacis. 

o have been a lover of peace seems to have been 
a high and esteemed characteristic. So thus an old 
epitaph in the Abbey of Charlieu on a knight and 
nobleman : — 

Pacem dilexit. Pax sit setema sibi. 

One on an abbot who died iia6 : — 

Pacis amator erat, rogo nunc in pace quiescat. 

On John Inger, Prior of St Barbara, in Nor- 
mandy : — 

i&mulus hie pacis. 

Decrees were passed in the Council of Bheims in 
1583, and by the Council of Tholouse in the year 
1590, not only to restrain the accumulating abuses in 
the style of sepulchres, from the revival of the classical 
or pagan taste, but also the inflated inscriptions which 
time and the pride of family had introduced. 



> ■ ■ "Ji * . '' . ' M< ■ — i^Piw^^sq^^apw^5gj^»csBa ^j. ' ^^j t i^^ ' 



198 god's acrk 

I suppose that the epitaph on Sir Philip Sidney, 
in St Paul's, beginning — 

England, Netherland, the Heavens and the Arts— > 

may be cited as a crowning instance of bombastic 
impiety.^ Addison says of those in Westminster 
Abbey, * Some epitaphs are so extravagant that 
the dead person would blush:' and, he satirically 
adds, * others so excessively modest, that they deliver 
the character of the person departed in Greek and 
Hebrew, and by that means are not understood once 
in a twelvemonth.' 

Fuller says, 'The shortest, plainest, and truest 
epitaphs are best. I say ' shortest^' for, when a pas- 
senger sees a chronicle written on a tomb, he takes 
it on trust some great man lies there buried, without 
taking pains to examine who he is. I say also ' the 
plainest,' for, except the sense lie above groimd, few 
will trouble themselves to dig for it' 

I give here the epitaph written by the Rev. Mr. 
Mason (author of Elfrida and Caractouytvs) to the 

^ Tet less offensive than those equivoques which, aiming at 
wit, do certunlj excel in profanity. 
On Dr. Walker, who wrote a work on English Particles :^- 

Here lie Walker's Particles. 

On Dr. Fuller :— 

Here lies Fuller's earth. 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 1 99 

memory of his wife/ which I copied from the tablet 
in Bristol Cathedral It is very beautifuL 

Epitaph on thr Wipe op the Eev. William Mason. 

Take, holy EarUi ! all that my soul holds dear : 
Take that best gift, which Heay'n so lately gave : 
To Bristol's fount I bore with trembling care 
Her fsAed. form : she bowed to taste the wave, 
And died. Does Touth, does Beauty, read, the lineP 
Does sympathetic fear their breasts alarm P 
Speak, dead Maria ! breathe a strain divine : 
Ev'n from the grave thou shalt have power to charm. 
Bid them be chaste, be innocent like thee; 
Bid them in Duty's sphere as meekly move; 
And if so fair, from vanity as free. 
As firm in friendship, and as fond in love. 
Tell them, though 'tis an awful thing to die, 
('Twas ev'n to thee,) yet, the dread path once trod, 
Heav'n lifts its everlasting portals high. 
And bids ' the pure in heart behold their God.' 

I conclude with the following degrading contrast 
from a monument in Horsleydown Church, in Cum- 
berland. It is another instance of the extent to 
which irreverence may be caxried. 

Here lie the bodies 
Of Thomafi Bond and Mary his wife. 
She was temperate, chaste, and charitable; 

But 

She was proud, peevish, and passionate. 

She was an affectionate wife, and a tender mother; 



doo qod's acre. 



But 

Her husbaud and child, whom she loved, 

Seldom saw her countenance without a disgusting frown, 

Whilst she received visitors whom she despised with an endearing 

smile. 
Her behaviour was discreet towards strangers, 

But 

Imprudent in her familj. 

Abroad her conduct was influenced by good breeding ; 

But 

At home by ill temper. 

She was a professed enemy to flattery. 

And was seldom known to praise or commend ; 

But 

The talents in which she principally excelled 

Were difference of opinion, and discovering flaws and imperfections. 

She was an admirable economist. 

And without prodigality 

Dispensed plenty to eveiy person in her family : 

But 

Would sacrifice their eyes to a farthing candle. 

She sometimes made her husb&nd happy with her good qualities, 

But 

Much more frequently miserable with her many failings, 

Insomuch that in thirty years cohabitation he oflen lamented 

That, maugre all her virtues. 
He had not on the whole enjoyed two years of matrimonial 

comfort. 

At Length, 

Finding that she had lost the affections of her husband, 

As well as the r^^rd of her neighbours. 

Family disputes having been divulged by servants^ 

She died of vexation, July so, 1768, 

Aged 48 years. 



TOMBS AND EPITAPHS. 20I 

Her worn-out husband survived her four months and two days. 

And departed this life Nov. 28, 1768, 

In the 54th year of his age. 

William Bond, brother to the deceased, erected this stone, 

As a weekly monitor to the surviving wives of this parish, 

That they may avoid the infamy 

Of having their memories handed to posterity 

With ApcUchioork character. 



CHAPTER IX. 

RELICS, SHBIKES^ AND PILQBIMAGE. 

TN the life of St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, 
-*■ written by his friend and deacon Pontius, who 
attended him in exile and witnessed his death, we 
are told that ' the brethren spread linen cloths and 
napkins on the ground before him,' for the purpose, 
of course, of preserving the blood that should flow 
during his decapitation. Nay, that, prior to this, when 
exhausted with a rapid journey to the place of judg- 
ment, he was perspiring profusely, an officer offered 
him change of raiment, in the hopes of possessing 
himself of the garments damp with what is called 
^ the now bloody sweat of the martyr on his road to 
God.' 

Whether this custom, begun in pious zeal, ever 
degenerated into the gross and disgusting usage so 
flippantly and so coarsely described by Erasmus,^ I 
cannot tell. There did not lack warnings even in 
those early days, from the fathers of the Church, as 
to the danger of abuses arising from the, originally, 

^ Colloquia, De Peregrinatio Seligionis JErgo. A well- 
known passage in this dialogue, too coarse for transcription here. 



BEUCS, SHRINES, AKD PILGBIMAQE. 203 

innocent and pure reverence for the remains of 
martyrs. What could be more pure, more becoming, 
than reverent care for the abused, shattered, and often 
widely scattered remains of those who had sealed 
their testimony with their blood under torturing irons 
and dislocating instruments used by the heathen per- 
secutors, or who were torn to pieces by the fangs of 
raging wild beasts in the public theatre ! 

Nothing, however, is more ancient than the custom 
of collecting the limbs, or blood, or vestments of the 
martyrs ; and it is recorded that seven women were 
put to death for collecting drops of the blood of St 
Blaise, during his torments. 

When St Germain, Bishop of Auxerre, was in 
England in the year A.D. 429, deputed by a Gallic 
Council to extirpate the Pelagian heresy, he visited 
the shrine of St. Alban, took up some of the earth on 
which the blood of our first martyr had fallen, and 
carried it back with him to France as a holy treasure. 

So great was the zeal to possess some of the soil 
where the body of King Oswald^ lay, that people 
taking a small portion, a few grains only, perhaps, 
from the spot where he fell, and putting it into 
water to give to th^ sick friends — ^that even ab- 



1 A celebrated monaroh of Northuinberland in the seventh 
century. 



d04 god's acbe, 

stracted in these small quantities^ a hole had been 
made five or six feet deep. This Bede records. This 
king was as charitable and pious as he was brave ; 
and he was canonized. Many miracles were supposed 
to have been wrought at his tomb. He was killed in 
a great battle against the then pagan Mercians, and 
his last uttered word is said to have been a prayer 
for mercy on the souls of his slayers. Hence, from 
' * Lord have mercy on their souls/ as Oswald said 
when he fell in battle/ a saying in the time of the 
Venerable Bede, is said to have originated our old 
country distich— 

When the hell begins to toll. 
Lord have mercy on the sowl.^ 

The practice of collecting articles of attire did not 
appertain merely to the identical garments worn by 
the martyr. Linen and other substances which had 
touched his remains came to be cousidered as valuable 
as the original vestments. Bodies and remains origi- 
nally were deposited in a kind of crypt, under the 
altar, into which apertures were so contrived, that 
the relics themselves might be touched by cloth or 
palls let down upon them. And so we are told that 
at the tombs of the martyrs the Christians let down 
veils, &;c., to touch the remains deposited there, ^ qua 



^ Bede, Hist. JScc, 1. iii. c. 9 and 12. 



RELICS^ SHBINES, AND PILGBDiAGE. 20j 

pro magna benedictione accipiebant/ Nay, even 
copies and images of relics were, after being touched 
to the real, considered with equal respect. 

But this supposed influence, so like that of the 

» 

magnet on the steel, does certainly in some degree 
account for the innumerable * thorns of the crown,' 
*bits of the true cross,' &c. &a, which have in- 
undated the world. It is not, I fancy, generally 
understood that anything which had touched a relic 
was considered of equal virtue with the original 

Of the surpassing holiness attributed to relics we 
have a very striking illustration in our own history, 
in reference to Harold, our last Saxon king. He had 
entered into an agreement before Edward's death 
to support the claims of William the Norman to 
the throne, and the astute bastard chose to have 
the arrangement ratified on oath, with all possible 
solemnity. Accordingly Harold stands between two 
altars, covered with cloth of gold, placing a hand on 
each whilst he utters it as stipulated. Then, the 
oath irrevocably taken, we learn that the wily Norman 
had * sent for all the holy bodies thither, and put so 
many of them together as to fill a whole chest, and 
then covered them with a pall ; but Harold neither 
saw them nor knew of their being there, for nought 
was shown or told to him about it; and over all 
was a phylactery, the best that he could select. When 



2o6 GOD'S ACBK 

Harold placed his hand upon it, the hand trembled 
and the flesh quivered ; but he swore, and promised 
upon his oath — so help him God and the holy relics 
there (meaning the Gospels, for he had none idea of 
any other). Many cried, * God grant it V and when 
Harold had kissed the saints, and had risen upon his 
feet, the duke led him up to the chest, and made 
him stand near it ; and took off the chest the pall 
that had covered it, and showed Harold upon what 
holy relics he had sworn, and he was sorely alarmed 
at the sight/ 

^ The hand trembled, trnd the flesh quivered.' 
There needs no farther illustration of the superstitious 
reverence in which relics were held in the eleventh 
century. Utterly unconscious Harold was of their 
presence, yet did (he all unknowing the while) — ^yet — 
so is it said— did ^ the hand tremble — ^the flesh quiver.' 

Edward the Confessor, a very superstitious monarch, 
the predecessor of Harold and William, re-erected 
the Abbey at Westminster, originally founded by 
Sebert, who had presented to it the beam of Christ's 
manger and other relics. Edward gave to this 
monastery part of the manger where Christ was bom ; 
of the sponge, the lance, the scourge wherewith he 
was tortured; of the sepulchre and grave cloth; 
some crumbs of Mounts Golgotha and Calvary; 
numberless relics of the Virgin Mary. These indeed 



BELICS, SHBINES^ AND PILQBIMAQ& 907 

were not a tithe of the treasures which Edward 
humbly offered, and which were received here with 
superstitious joy ; and the number of relics which^ in 
the course of two or three centuries, was accumulated 
within the abbey from the benefactions of the pious 
would surpass credibility, though gravely registered 
by many historians 

In Wales a person might go out of Sanctuary and 
be safe, if he carried relics with him. They were held 
in the same estimation as a cross. 

In the seventh century, when all Christians were 
hurrying from the East, escaping from the fury of 
the Saracens then lording it over holy places, num- 
bers of relics of saints were brought by them into the 
West. Then were churches built expressly to re- 
ceive these relics, as that of St Peter in Yincoli, to 
preserve the chain with which Herod bound St. 
Peter in the prison of Jerusalem. 

It will of course be readily guessed that the charge 
of relics so venerated was in itself no slight or secondary 
office. We are told that the bishops of the first agea 
used to carry them about in cases of gold ; then they 
were placed in crystal shrines, visible to all ; and at 
length the original custom of placing them in a crypt 
beneath the altar came into disuse ; and shrines of 
more or less expense were erected in churches for the 
safeguard as also for the exhibition of the relics 



2o8 god's acbe. 

which the church possessed, and for the reception of 
offerings constantly made to them. 

In the Preface and Glossary to the Wa/rdrobe 
Accounts of Edward I. are some curious particulars 
respecting a relic of the True Cross. 

Offerings were made to two crosses in Our Lady's 
Chapel at Greenwich, to one in Chertsey Abbey, 
and to the relics on the high altar there. 

But the cross in greatest veneration was that of 
Gneyth. To this, more frequent offerings appear to 
have been made than to any other cross or relique. 
Robert Wisheart, Bishop of Glasgow, who had been 
long detained prisoner by the English, swore fealty 
to Edward in the most solemn manner : — ' Sur le cors 
nostre Seigneur, et la croys neyty et la blake rode de 
Escoce.' With it were joined the thorns of Christ's 
crown, and to both were offerings made in the Royal 
Chapel at Windsor. 

* On the 3rd of April, offering of the king to the 
relics on the high altar in the abbey church of 
Stratford, 7s. 

* And to the cross Gneyth, 55. 

* And to the thorns of Christ's crown, 35. 

'Summa, 158.' 
Henry IV., on St George's day, in the fourth year 
of his reign, offered in his chapel at Windsor to the 
cross Neyt, 68. 8c?. 



RELICS^ SHBINES, AND PILQRIMAOE. 2,0g 

This precious relic of part of the True Cross is in- 
serted in the Pope's Bull, i8 Henry VII., to be kept 
at Windsor, and was known by the name of the 
Crosse Neyth. 

There is a tradition that Edward I. received it in 
1383 as a gift from the Secretary of the Prince of 
Wales ; that it was called Neet, because Neotus, a 
native of that principality, brought it from? the Holy 
Land. It is added from Matthew Paris that a hermit 
told Bichard I. he should not conquer Jerusalem, 
and then presented him with a portion of the Holy 
Cross: 'quae usque hodie habetur apud Windzour, 
et Cros de Neet a vulgo dicitur/ 

Begarding it, Bymer, in his Fcedera, says: 'Of 
this cross (Oneyth) Edward L granted to the ten 
persons who brought back to him at Conway that 
piece of the wood of the cross which the Welsh call 
Crosse-neyht, and which Lewellyn late Prince of 
Wales, and his predecessors Princes of Wales, had^ 
exemption from following his army in any expedition 
out of the four cantreds/ 

In the year 13 13 a Cross, full of reliques of various 
saints, was set on St Paul's steeple, to preserve from 
all danger of tempests. 

The portable receptacles for small detached relics 
progressed in time to large stationary shrines. The 
tombs in which reposed the remains of holy men 

P 



210 god's acre. 

were surmounted by canopies, and there the pious 
might pray, and the liberal deposit their offerings. 
These shrines in their donstruction, setting aside the 
offerings made to them, were fruitful mediums for 
taste, expense, and decoration. In the seventh cen- 
tury Oswald, king of Northumberland, had a silver 
Bhrine at Bamborough.^ 

In the* eighth century the Venerable Bede was 
buried in St. Paul's church, in Jarrow. In 1020 
his remains were conveyed to Durham, and laid in 
the shrine of St Cuthbert 

In the year 1 155 they were taken up by Hugh, Bishop 
of Durham, and inclosed in a rich shrine of curious 
workmanship, adorned with gold, silver, and jewels. 

The shrine of St John of Dalderby was silver ; but 
in Lincoln Cathedral was a sumptuous one of gold, 
land we read of others of which language hardly seems 
to suffice to describe the gorgeousness. 
, As will be seen from the above description, insuffi- 
cient as it is. Shrines were of two sorts : portable ones, 
which, containing small relics, could be borne about 
in processions, and displayed wherever circumstances 
should render it desirable; and large fixed ones, 
erected, as I have said, above the very resting-place 
of the dead. These indeed often differed little from 



i- 



* See supra, page 203. 



RELICS, SHBINES, AND PILGRIMAQK 211 

any other grand sepulchral monument of the day; 
forming a sort of roof or canopy, supported on pillars, 
rising from the comers of the tomb; gorgeous 
and elaborate in arrangement, often most costly in 
material. To many of them there was a' small Altar 
attached, bearing the name of the enshrined saint 

The most noted of any, perhaps, in England, was 
that of Thomas k Becket, at Canterbury ; but those 
of St. Cuthbert and the Venerable Bede at Durham^ 
of Edward the Confessor at Westminster, and of our 
proto-martyr Alban, in the abbey which bears his 
name, have been widely celebrated, and were, doubt- 
less, truly magnificent 

The fame of Becket's has, however, been so widely 
spread and enduring, that some further particulars 
can be hardly out of place. 

There is not in the pages of history a record of any 
saint or martyr to whose memory such adulation was 
offered for a long period of years as to St Thomas k 
Becket Nay, even the Cathedral itself — which 
shortly afber his death was again, for the third time, 
burnt, and the choir rebuilt with greater magnificence 
than ever, an additional semicircular chapel being 
raised on purpose to receive his remains — the cathedral 
itself lost for a considerable time its proper designa- 
tion, and was called the church of St. Thomas the 
Martyr. 

P2 



21 a god's acbk. 

The murdered Archbishop lay for some time where 
he had fallen, none of the monks, after the fearful 
warning of their brother,^ daring to approach him 
until the armed men had all quitted the church. But 
not content with murder, these ruffians brutally 
threatened to drag his body from the church, and 
cast it to dogs. Leaving the corpse therefore at 
present before the altar, the moment the darkness 
favoured their pious intention, with sighs and tears, 
with deep reverence but scant ceremony, the monks 
bore the hapless Becket to the crypt, and there 
buried him in its darkest and most secluded comer ; 
and there, in that unattractive spot, were honours 
paid to the remains which were not surpassed by any 
offered in the magnificent chapel to which they were 
subsequently transferred. Perhaps no murder ever 
excited more general horror than this; and the 
church being desecrated by it, was suspended firom 
divine offices, its splendid ornaments and decorations 
were all removed, and its musical bells were forbidden 
to sound their holy summons to prayer. 

This catastrophe took place in December, and if 
we are to credit the monkish historians, it was even so 
soon as the Easter following that miracles began to be 
wrought at the martyr's humble tomb. These quickly 
increased in number and consequence ;.the circle which 

1 One monk raised his arm to protect the prelate, and had it 
severed from his body. 



RELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGK 213 

they influenced began gradually to be enlarged, until 
at length not merely Canterbury, but all England, 
and then many kingdoms of the Continent, resounded 
with the fame of the miracles wrought by calling 
upon his name alone. He was therefore canonized 
by Pope Alexander, a solemn mass was performed in 
his honour, and it was ordained that the memory of 
his martyrdom should be celebrated for ever on the 
29th day of December. 

At the Reformation the shrines of the saints were 
plundered by the royal commissioners, but these 
were anticipated by private robbers in many places. 
At the sanie time the relics were scattered or publicly 
burnt. By the thoughtful, however, many were 
decently interred in consecrated ground. 

The first pilgrim of any consequence to Becket's 
shrine, or rather as yet to his lowly tomb, was the 
royal personage whose hasty words had been the 
immediate cause of his unjustifiable murder. * 

As soon as the towers of the cathedral appeared in 
sight, at a distance of three miles, Henry dismounted 
from his horse, and proceeded, clad in sackcloth and 
barefooted, to Canterbury. * With smileless look and 
visage wan,^ he entered the porch of the church, 
tracking his path with blood, so lacerated were his 
feet with the rough road over which he had travelled. 
He was conducted by some monks to the crypt, where 
he threw himself on the ground before the arch* 



a 14 GODS ACBE. 

bishop-8 tomb, and continued some time in prayer. 
Then, in a form previously specified, he strenuously 
denied any cognisance of, or participation in the 
death of Becket ; but in acknowledgment of the in- 
considerate words which led to that outrage, he 
voluntarily submitted himself to the discipline of the 
Church. He was scourged by the monks — each in 
turn giving him some lashes — and he passed that 
day and night, and a considerable portion of the next 
day also, on the bare ground before the tomb. All 
this time he was fasting. When the full penance 
which the bad taste of the then triumphant church- 
men required, was completed, the king returned to 
London, and we can hardly be surprised to find that 
he had a very severe illness. 

Although this penance was deemed sufficient — ^as 
surely indeed it might — Henry frequently repeated 
his visits to the saint's shrine for prayer and ofierings, 
especially on going to or returning from Normandy ; 
and now royal and noble pilgrims came in crowds to 
the tomb, round which a temporary wooden chapel 
was erected. In 1177 Philip, Earl of Flanders, 
visited it; in 1178 William, Archbishop of Rheims, 
came from France with a large retinue, to perform 
his vows to 'St. Thomas of Canterbury;' and in 
1179 Louis, King of France, landed* at Dover with 
the same intention. It was the first time that he or 



RELICS, SHKINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. ^Ij 

any of his predecessors had ever set foot on English 
soil — ^but all individual dislike, or even national pre- 
judice, sank before the urgency of his motive. He 
was impelled to take this step by the dangerous ill- 
ness of his only son, afterwards the celebrated Philip 
Augustus ; and he resolved to supplicate the aid of 
St. Thomas of Canterbury. 

The English king welcomed Louis with great 
honours at Dover, having ridden all night, during an 
eclipse of the moon, in order to welcome him, meeting, 
him even ' as hee entred out of shippe/ The two 
kings rode together with much pomp and a great train 
of nobility to Canterbury, and were received in great 
state by the archbishop and convent and a multitude 
of noblemen who went to meet them. But before the 
French king entered the cathedral, he doflfed his 
regal habiliments ; and unjewelled, unadorned, in the 
humble guise of a pilgrim, he approached the tomb, 
being conducted thither in solemn procession. ' Hee 
continued all one night in watching and prayer at 
the tombe, and in the morning required to be made a 
brother there, and was admitted/ 

His offerings were very costly. *A rych cup of 
golde y * ye renowned precious stone that was called 
the Regall of France ' — reckoned the finest diamond 
in the world, and so judged, apparently, by Henry 
VIII., who transferred it from the shrine to his own 



7,i6 gob's acek 

finger : — ^three Morti oiamelled with gold and silver 
images, and three others of the same enamelled with 
the Crucifixion on the right side and the Annuncia- 
tion on the left ; and finally one hundred muids of 
wine yearly for ever, confirming the same by Charter. 

Though Philip the Dauphin recovered, this pil- 
grimage was attended with rueful consequences to 
the French king himself; for he took a cold during 
the night of his vigil which he was imable to subdue, 
and which in a few months terminated in his death. 

If the religious feeling and the superstition of the 
day had not led the minds of men to pilgrimage and 
offerings, the occurrences we have named would have 
been sufficient to constitute it a fashion. Therefore 
we cannot be surprised to learn that the pilgrimages 
to Becket's shrine became constant, and the offerings 
a source of enormous wealth. * These royal examples 
of kings and great persons were followed by multi- 
tudes, who crowded to present with full hands their 
oblations at his tomb.' The old historians say they 
will not venture to set down the amount of the offer- 
ings made in the course of a very few years, since it 
will appear so incredible, that people will suppose 
they are saying what is not true. By permission of 
the Pope a certain proportion of the wealth thus 
acquired was appropriated to the erection of the new 
fabric of the church of Canterbury (which had again 




RELICS, SHBINES> AND PILGRDCAGE. 217 

been redaced by fire), and hence it is that this fabric 
— much of which we now see — was so magnificent in 
conception and so beautiful in execution. 

We remarked that a part of this new erection, a 
semicircular chapel, still bearing the name of Becket's 
Crown, was appropriated as a shrine for his remains. 
Hither were they transferred in July, 1220, with the 
greatest solemnity and rejoicings. The king attended 
the ceremony, and the coffin was borne by dignified 
bishops and abbots, closely attended, if not assisted, 
by Pandulph, Legate of the Holy See, and by the 
Archbishops of Canterbury and Rheim& The day 
was observed throughout the city like a coronation 
day, or the highest of festivals. The pipes and con* 
duits ran wine in various parts of the city. Pro- 
visions and provender for man and horse were supplied 
at the Primate's own cost, all the way between Lon- 
don and Canterbury, for any who chose to come ; and 
so enormous were the expenses consequent on the 
celebration, that it is said the revenues of the arch- 
bishopric had not recovered the shock even in the 
time of Boniface, the fourth succeeding archbishop. 

The shrine of the martyr, which was placed behind 
the High Altar, was built to about a man's height of 
stone, then upwards of timber, within which was an 
iron chest containing the remains. The timber- work 
part of the shrine was covered with plates of gold 



2l8 GOD'd AGUE. 

riclily embossed, and inlaid with precious stones and 
orient pearl. 

The offerings were so perpetual, and in their accu- 
mulation of such immense value, that it became an 
office of no slight importance to watch over their 
safety. On displaying them to any distinguished 
visitor, the prior himself would point to them with a 
white wand, telling of each the name, the price, and 
the donor. Erasmus says that he saw gems there as 
large as a goose's egg. These offerings were of every 
possible variety. One is recorded as a wonder of the 
world — ^which doubtless at that time it would be 
considered. It was an orange enclosed in crystal, and 
offered by that accomplished gentleman and cele- 
brated traveller Sir John Mandeville. It is said that 
when this shrine was demolished the treasures of it 
filled two great chests, which six or eight men could 
scarcely carry out of the church. 

When the body of St Alban was discovered, Offa, 
King of Merda (who died 796), adorned the skull 
with a gold circle or diadem thus engraved : — 

Sic ett caput Sancti Alhani Anglorum Prothomartyris, 

and caused the coffin or shrine in which the body lay 

to be plated with gold and silver and precious stones. 

The altars and shrines of churches were mines of 




RELICS, SHBINES, AND PILGBIMAQE. 219 

incalculable riches. In the middle ages, the quantities 
of gold, silver, and jewels, accumulated in churches 
from alms and oflferings, would almost exceed beUef. 
It is a fact well a^ertained by mineralogists, that the 
most precious gems in the world were offered to 
churches, and that many of them are still remaining 
in those sanctuaries. The church of St. Mark, at 
Venice, received the spoils of Constantinople. At 
Loretto, the value of the jewellery accumulated — as 
topazes, emeralds, sapphires, rubies, diamonds, agates, 
and lapis lazuli— could hardly be estimated. 

In our own country, the finest jewel which even 
that gorgeously attired monarch Henry VIII. could 
exhibit, was taken from the shrine of Thomas a 
Becket, which was indeed so tremendously rich that 
Erasmus can hardly find words to express his wonder 
at the sight. Great, too, were the treasures accumu^ 
lated by various gifts, and by the offerings of pilgrims 
at many other shrines, as at St. Alban's, Walsingham, 
Ipswich, Worcester, Westminster, and Winchester. 

A natural and necessary consequence of this im- 
mense accumulation of wealth, was the appointment 
of guardians of the shrines thus enriched by pious 
offerings. The Gustos Feretfi became therefore an 
office of great importance and trust. Each remark- 
able shrine had an appointed guardian, probably, as at 
Westminster, one of the resident monks. At St 



220 god's acre. 

Alban's there is, or recently was, a sort of wooden 
watch-bouse remaining, on the north side of the shrine 
of the protomartyr, and which doubtless, in palmier 
days, had been occupied by the appointed Custos. 

The details given in the foregoing pages are but 
preliminary to the chief subject of this chapter — 
FiLOBiMAGE — a custom almost as old as the world, 
and which has its origin in that innate, deep-seated 
feeling of reverence for the markedly good or great 
in this world, and of solemn awe towards that un- 
known bourne whither they have passed before us, 
which more or less pervades the whole human race, 
' If there be,' says a powerful modem writer, * supernal 
influences acting upon the mind of man; if the 
winged spirits that minister before the throne still 
descend to earth on missions of mercy, I will believe 
that their loved place is round the grav^ where sleeps 
the mortal portion of the holy/ 

Such was the influence which in ancient days took 
the devout Egyptian to the tomb of * Him who sleeps 
in Fhilae/ Solemn troops of pilgrims, from the mighty 
Bameses on his throne to the goatherd in the mud 
hovel, crowded for centuries to pray at the grave of 
the beneficent Osiris. 

At a later period multitudes of devout worshippers 
toiled to the summit of Mount Hor, to the tomb of 



BELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. 2^1 

the magnificent priest and leader of the Israelitish 
host It has been supposed that the grave of his still 
greater brother was hidden by the angels who 
buried him, lest in after ages it should prove a 
temptation to idolatrous worship. But es^erly have 
devotees fixed their hermit abodes amid those wild 
fastnesses of Sinai, which it may be supposed the feet 
of Moses had trodden. Thousands did this. 

The oaks in Mamre, where the great patriarch con- 
versed with the angels, have been an object of 
pilgrimage from the time of Abraham to that of 
Constantine. 

Later still the followers of Mohammed turned their 
hearts, eyes, and painful footsteps to Mecca. There 
is indeed still an annual pilgrimage of Arabs to this 
place, subject even now on the journey to so much 
privation and danger, that the period of the absence 
of the pilgrims is ever a season of much anxiety to 
their relatives and friend& A governor of the expedi- 
tion is appointed yearly, the caravan sometimes 
amounting to as many as seventy thousand people. 

And still yearly, at Easter, a concourse of thou- 
sands of pilgrims make a toilsome journey to bathe 
in the waters of the Jordan ; a dangerous one too, as 
predatory Arabs are always on the watch along the 
road. The Turkish governor sends a guard with 
each caravan ; but * woe,' we are told, * to the poor 



222 god's acre. 

pilgrim who lags behind, or is overtaken at nightfall 
on the outskirts of the camp.' 

The most recent writer on Palestine, in describing 
the bathing of the pilgrims, speaks of the ' absence 
of any display of enthusiasm'— of the ' business-like 
aspect' — the 'primitive domestic character of the 
whole transaction.' In this Mr. Stanley differs from 
previous writers. Miss Martineau says, ' they rush in 
in such numbers, and with so little precaution, that 
some are drowned every year ;' and Warburton says, 
' the pilgrims rush into the deep and rapid river with 
such enthusiasm, that they are not unfrequently 
carried away by it and drowned.' 

The pilgrims usually provide themselves with white 
dresses wherein to bathe ; and these, having been so 
used, are kept for their winding-sheets.^ 

But chiefest of all these shrines, and of every and 
any of the many more which might be cited, stands 

j£BnSALEM. 

To visit that land 

Over whose acres walked those blessed feet. 
That eighteen hundred years ago were nailed 
For our redemption, to the bitter cross, 

is a wish, an impulse, which is proof against the sneer 
of infidelity, and the more indurating test of modem 



^ Among the early Christians the white baptismal dress was 
worn for a whole week, and then laid up in the church. A sort 
of witness against such as might break their tows. 



BELICS, SHBJNES, AND PILGRIMAGE. 223 

* progress' and practica The testimony of Dr. Clarke, 
the traveller, as to the feelings inspired by the first 
sight of the Holy City, is a valid answer to a host of 
sneerers. 

' ' Hagiopolis r exclaimed a Qreek in the van of 
our cavalcade, and instantly throwing himself from 
his horse, was seen upon his knees bareheaded. 
Suddenly the sight biirst upon us all. The effect pro- 
duced was that of perfect idlence throughout the 
whole company. Many of our party, by an imme- 
diate impulse, took ofif their hats as if entering a 
church, without being sensible of so doing. The 
Greeks and Catholics shed torrents of tears ; presently 
beginning to cross themselves with an unfeigned 
devotion, they asked if they might be permitted to 
take :off the covering from their feet, and proceed 
barefooted to the Holy Sepulchre. We had not been 
prepared for the grandeur of the spectacle which the 
dty alone exhibited.' 
. The most faithful, true, and life-like author in the 
whole realm of modem fiction writes : — 

* Who that has beheld both (i.e., Rome and Jeru- 
aalem) can forget that first aspect of either ? At the 
end of years, the emotion occasioned by the sight 
still thrills in your memory, and it smites you as at 
the moment when you first viewed it.'^ 

^ Thackeray. 



2^4 GOD^S ACBE, 

^I should like/ says Soutliey, ^to believe that one 
of my ancestors had served in the Crusades, or made 
a pilgrimage to Jerusalem/ 

I believe that Tasso is considered strictly to have 

followed the history, the real life of .the time in the 

description which he gives of the depression of spirits 

and humility of feeling which succeeded the first 

triumphant expression by the Crusaders on beholding 

Jerusalem. It were literary murder to add one word, 

or take one, from the beautiful text which I give in 

Wiffen's translation : — 

Scantly they durst their feehle eyes digpread 

Upon that town, where Christ was sold and bought; 

Where, for our sins, he, faultless, suffered pain ; 

There where he died, and where he lived again. 

Soft words, low speech, deep sobs, sweet sighs, salt tears. 

Rose from their breasts, with joy and pleasure mizt : 

For thus fares he the Lord aright that fears. 

Fear on devotion, joy on faith is fixt : 

Their naked feet trod on the dusty way. 

Following th' ensample of their zealous guide; 

Their scarfs, their crests, their plumes and feathers gay, 

They quickly doft, and willing laid aside.^ 

I had at one period of my life the great pleasure 
of intimate acquaintance with a gentleman who, in 
intervals of leisure in a busy life of diplomacy, had 



^ Certain that the reperusal of Mr. Warburton's description of 
the approach to Jerusalem will be acceptable to many, his graphic 
picture is given in full at the end of the chapter. 



RELICS, SHRINES, AKD PILGRIMAGE. 2,2^ 

gone twice to the Holy Land ; and when I knew him, 
he, almost an octogenarian, was most earnestly de- 
siring again to visit that sacred soil, if age and time 
would permit. They did not : he was soon called to 
his rest. He was no zealot, but an active-minded 
and practical man ; a consistent, earnest member of 
the Church of England. 

Though this ardent and earnest desire to see the 
Holy Land doubtless took many there whom religious 
zeal made indiflferent to the toil of the way ; and 
though many were commanded to go there as 
penance for sin, by their spiritual directors, still Pil- 
grimage was at one time as much a fashion as any 
modern excitement And it was by no means an easy 
or a safe journey to Jerusalem, either by sea or by 
land. Risk, toil, and privation were inevitable ac- 
companiments. 

It was a mighty engine in the hands of the Church, 
which ordered homicides and other culprits to atone 
for their sins by pilgrimage to various places in 
foreign lands. They were bound the while with 
iron chains round the neck and both arms, which 
were only removed by the grace of the Church, de- 
pendent on the conduct of the pilgrim. The four 
iknights who murdered Becket were enjoined to 
make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and to live as peni- 
tents in the mountains there. 



az6 god's acbs. 

It has been written by one, not of the Boman com- 
munion, that there is ' nothing so likely to bow down 
a proud spirit, and soften it into deep and purifying 
thought, as a long distant journey. There is no heart 
proof against the solemn influence of solitude among 
strange and impressive scenes. The new forms imder 
which nature presents herself, are so many proofs 
that there is an existence and a power, of which, in 
the thoughtless uniformity of the past, it had received 
no idea ; and with that new consciousness rushes in a 
train of feelings, which, if not the same, are nearer 
than most others to those inspired by religion. For 
this effect of the long and often perilous journey 
which he prescribed, the priest might look with some 
degree of confidence ; and no doubt experience taught 
him, that the hardest of his penitents was not likely 
to come back fi'om Syria with a mind unimpressed 
with the sentiments he wished to inspire.' 

Resorted to, then, of choice as a means of self-dis- 
cipline and penitence by numbers of great and good 
people, and ordained by the Church as an atonement 
on the part of others, and as a powerful engine of 
ecclesiastical government, we shall not be surprised 
to find that the comfort and care of pilgrims were 
objects of much solicitude to various monarchs and 
bishops, especially to those who knew personally the 
toils and risks to be encountered on the way. Ina, 



mBSBBBBBSBmBm^ 



BELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. Z2f 

Kingof Wessex,the founder of Glastonbury Monastery^ 
Cenred of Mercia, Offa, and Knute the Dane, all made 
pilgrimage, not indeed to Jerusalem, but to Borne. 

This was a goal only second in repute to Jerusalem; 
for the early Christian martyrs, seen by us so dimly in 
the distance, were vividly present then : their garment? 
not waxen old, their blood hardly dry, their tombs 
undecayed, and the very instruments with which they 
had been tortured hanging around — and to the other- 
inducements of this pilgrimage, the receiving absolu^ 
tion from the hands of the Pope himself was con- 
sidered most important. 

Pilgrimage was not lightly undertaken ; the sanc- 
tion of the Church was necessary, and its blessing 
sought. One holy father thus writes to a pilgrim :— • 

* Make safe your journey by confession, and re- 
member to guard it by alms/ 

And another — 

'I advise and entreat you not to carry your sin» 
with you, but get rid of them eflFectually by a general 
and exact confession of all your offences from your 
youth.' 

Prepared thus by religious exercise, the pilgrim 
was furnished with a sort of testimonial or recom- 
mendatory letter from the Church. Exemption from 
tolls on the roads and bridges had at various times 
been gained on behalf of pilgrims. Enute; on his 

Q 2 



aa8 god's acre. 

return from pilgrimage to Rome, had purchased this 
exemption for pilgrims at many places, at an enor- 
mous expense. Other sovereigns followed the 
example. 

Having made confession of sins and humbled 
themselves in prayer, appropriate intercessions were 
offered for the pilgrims, and psalms chanted over 
them by the priests, who likewise consecrated the 
scrips and staves, placing a scrip round the neck of 
each pilgrim. King Bichard Coeur de Lion received 
the scrip and staff of pilgrimage from the Archbishop 
of Tours, and proceeding to Marseilles, embarked on 
the 7 th of August, 1 1 90, on his expedition to the 
Holy Land. Those whose destination was Jerusalem 
had a cross emblazoned on their garment On 
returning from Palestine they cut boughs of the 
palm of the country, which on their arrival at home 
they placed on the altar of the church, whither they 
immediately repaired to oflfer thanksgivings for their 
-safety. 

Spenser's portraiture of a pilgrim, however well 
known, is too beautiful to be unwelcome. 

At length they chaanst to meet npon the way 
An aged sire, in long blacke weedes ydad ; 
His feete all bare, his beard all hoary gray. 
And by his belt his booke he hanging had; 
Sober he seemdo, and very sagely sad, 



EELICS, SHRINES, AKD PILGRIMAGE. 22g 

And to the ground his eyes were lowly bent, 

Simple in show» and voide of malice bad ; 

And all the way he prayed as he went. 

And often knockt his breast, as one that did repent. 

And Walter Scott's description of a palmer is very 
graphic. The difference between a pilgrim and a 
palmer is, that the former made a penitential journey 
to some appointed shrine, and then returned to his 
accustomed residence : the palmer, on the contrary, 
spent his whole life in travelling from one holy shrine 
to another.^ 

Here is a holy palmer come. 

From Salem first, and last from Bome : 

One that hath kiss'd the blessed tomb. 

And visited each holy shrine. 

In Araby and Palestine ; 

On hills of Ar^nenie hath been. 

Where rest of ark may yet be seen 5 

By that Bed Sea, too, hath he trod. 

Which parted at the prophet's rod; 

In Sinai's wilderness he saw 

^ According to some ; but the more usually received and pro- 
bably more correct opinion is, that a palmer was one who, having 
made his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, or frequently, only to Bome, 
brought a palm-leaf thence, and placed it before the altar in the 
church of his home, as a token of his vow completed. 

Valencia is said to be the only place in Europe where the date 
palm ripens ; but the tree is especially cultivated in a hot sandy 
valley on the coast of Gtenoa, that the leaves may be available for 
the Church services of Palm Sunday, 



tZ30 GOD'd ACBfi. 

The mount where Israel heard the law ; 
He shows Saint James's cockle-shell; 
Of fair Montserrat, too, can tell ; 
And of that grot where olives nod- 
Where, darling of each heart and eye, 
From all the youth of Sicily 
Saint Eosalie retired to €rod. 
To stout Saint Greoige, of Norwich, merry; 
Saint Thomas, too, of Canterhury ; 
Cuthhert of Durham, and Saint Bede, 
For his sins' pardon hath he prayed. 
He knows the passes of the north. 
And seeks for shrines heyond the Forth; 
Little he eats, and long will wake. 
And drinks hut of the stream or lake j 
This were a guide— 

Though Jerusalem ranked immeasurably before 
other pilgrimages in holiness as well as in difficulty 
of access, and Eome as second, yet in Egypt there 
were many objects of devout visitation; and the 
shrine of the martyr, St James of Compostella, in 
Spain, was resorted to by great numbers. In fact, 
the number of pilgrims and devotees at holy places 
was 80 great, that whole towns sprang up for their 
accommodation, and became established by their 
support 

Sir Francis Falgrave tells us that even in the 
fourteenth century, upon the best estafetted road, 
the road to Rome, nearly three months necessarily 
elapsed before the pilgrim, quitting the shrine of 



RELICS, SHI^INES, AND PILGRIMAGE. 23 1 

St. Thomas at Canterbury, could reach the portals of 
the Vatican. Jerusalem was greatly more trying; 
and though the pardons of the Holy Land began at 
Jaffa, it seems that by far the heaviest sufferings of 
the pilgrim began there also. This place had been 
a heap of ruins since the expulsion of the Franks ; 
the Saracens reigned paramount there, and thought 
no exactions too great, no ill-usage too brutal, to be 
lavished on the ill-fated pUgrims. There is extant a 
drawing of Jaffa of the fifteenth century, or at least 
there is an engraving from it in the Archceologiay 
which represents pilgrims landing at Jaffa, and 
Saracens on the watch, most cruelly wajlaying and 
beating them in their weary and diflBcult progress 
from the boat. They are driven to miserable vaults 
in the ruins for their first shelter, amid all the dis- 
comfiture of dirt, want, and most probably disease. 

Jaffa, now called Yafa, is a place of old renown under 
its first name, Joppa. Here the prophet Jonah took 
shipping when ' he fled from the presence of the Lord.' 
Hither Hiram sent cedar of Lebanon for the building 
of the Temple. It was here that the good widow 
Tabitha was raised from the dead ; and it was here 
that St. Peter saw the vision described in the loth 
chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, by which he 
learnt that God's ^ mercy is not strained/ but was 
open alike to Jew or Gentile. 



2^% god's ACBE. 

It had sunk into utter insignificance when its 
value, as the nearest port to the Holy City, attracted 
the attention of the Crusaders, and for a time 
revived its importance. 

Its appearance from the sea is stately, as from the 
extreme inequality of the ground it shows all at 
once, in a succession of terracea But there are no 
trees or verdure whatever, and it is now a dirty laby- 
rinth of poor streets, interspersed with convents and 
khans, with ruinous walls and waste places. It still 
affords some sort of shelter to numberless pilgrims : 
the Franciscan convent alone is said to accommodate 
a thousand. 

It has also gained a most shocking notoriety as the 
place where Buonaparte slaughtered his prisoners in 
cold blood. 

Travels to the Holy Land are not unusual now as 
matters of religious feeling, though hardly under- 
taken with a view to religious penance (the facilities 
of travelling now do indeed neutralize the idea of 
penance). But this pilgrimage, as a general fashion, 
ceased with us about the time of Henry V. 

I have dwelt so long on this interesting and 
romantic exhibition of life in former days, that my 
remaining notices must be brief. The subject, how- 
ever, is not merely interesting, but important, as 



EELICS, SHRINES, AOT) PILGRIMAGE. 233 

displaying one element in the civilization of those 
romantic times. As unquestionably the institutions 
of chivalry were of the highest benefit to society in 
its then unorganized state, so did this concomitant 
spirit of pilgrimage tend to soften manners, to spread 
knowledge, and to extend the great tie and charity of 
brotherhood between East and West. How our science 
and learning emanated from the East, every dabbler 
in literature can tell. How much of this was borne 
by pilgrims and palmers it is impossible now even to 
guess. That their exaggerations, whether of ignorance 
or wilfulness, might at times justly subject them to 
the rebuke of * lying pilgrim,^ is true doubtless ; but, 
on the other hand, where is there any great fount of 
human knowledge which has not some rill of error 
trickling adown it ? 

Eemember we that numbers of these pilgrims were 
knights and nobles of the highest degree, the most 
untarnished honour, who — to put aside for a moment 
the sacred behests of religion^ — would scorn a lie as 
they would a coward. Their own ignorance and want 
of education and of general knowledge might — no 
doubt did — ^render them liable to imposition; and 
their own perfect truthfulness would make them 
credulous; but no knight, worthy of his spurs, or 
gentleman, meriting the name, ever knowingly told 
an untruth. 



234 god's acbe. 

That ^ accomplished knight and perfect gentleman/ 
Sir John Mandeville, published a book which' there 
have not been persons wanting to call 'a tissue of 
lies/ Exaggerations there are, and errors and blun* 
ders there are, and circumstances which mark credu- 
lity, a liability to deception; but no intentional 
want of truth. Indeed, some of his statements, 
formerly thought ridiculous, have been stamped by 
the more accurate and critical knowledge of our 
days — true. The fault lay in our ignorance, as much 
as in his credulity. 

Forget we not either that a very considerable pro- 
portion of these pilgrims were vowed members of the 
Church, monks, friars, and priests. Bemember we 
too in whose hands was vested in those days our all 
of knowledge, learning, and science— medical skill 
and science more especially. It is beyond a doubt 
that many drugs and medicines of now acknowledged 
value, and in constant request^ found their way to 
Europe in the first induce by the hands of these 
wanderers ; and it is well known that they repaid the 
hospitality they met with by the only means in their 
power^ i, e., medicining the ailments of those among 
whom they passed. Cures attributed entirely to the 
holiness of the pilgrim, were oftentimes but the result 
of a small portion of medical skill, which the Church, 
as a custom and duty, habituated her sons to acquire* 



BELICS, SHRINES, AND PILOBIMAQE. 2^^ 

Thus was the custom of Pilgrimage one of the re* 
generating influences in the social life of the ' dark' 
and middle ages, and, like other institutions of the 
time, as beneficent in its operations then as it would 
be foolish and useless now. These things look so 
romantic and strange only because we view them 
alone, and not in their fair connexion with and corre- 
spondence to other parts and integral portions of the 
general life of the aga If we reflect on the actual 
circumstances of life and society, from the throne to 
the hovel, from the king to the serf, we shall see how 
institutions — such as Chivalry, for instance — ^with all 
their faults, and their utter inaptitude to modem times, 
were admirably suited to the state of Christendom 
then. 

To refer for an instant to the monastic and con* 
ventual systema 

How could a rich and orphaned maiden of gentle 
birth escape a forced marriage, or worse, but by 
taking refuge in a convent ? 

Where was the famished serf to get food, or the 
toil-worn wayfarer shelter, or the hapless traveller, 
robbed and wounded by ru£San hands, relief, but at 
the nearest monastery ? 

Above all, in wild and desolate districts, who would 
admit the babe bom under the primeval curse to the 
regenerating water — ^who sanction the tie of marriage 



2^6 god's acbe. 

— who breathe the deprecatory prayer over the dead 
—but the travelling monk, or the wandering friar ? 

We know the abuses which accrued; no one in 
these days seeks to deny them. 

But the selfsame spirit and feeling which formerly 
caused people to found hospitals, to endow monas- 
teries, to reverence sanctuaries, and to send armed 
knights forth to redress the wrongs of the afflicted, or 
erring but repentant pilgrims to kneel at their 
Bedeemer's shrine — the selfsame spirit in this our 
day, nerved English women to tend their sick and 
wounded brethren in the Crimea. 

To return : 

Strongly as pilgrimage was recommended as an 
incentive to holiness, urgently as it was enforced and 
commanded as a penance to the earing, a stimulus to 
the weak, and a corrective to the wicked, it was 
clearly impossible and impracticable — ^as to foreign 
shrines — to hundreds and thousands of the weaker 
sex (the most influenced usually by pious sentiment), 
and to the serfs of the land. Christians, sinners, and 
* pilgrims on earth,' as well as the highest True, 
many women of all classes did go to Jerusalem, or to 
Sinai ; did go to Bome ; did go to Compostella — but 
they were but as drops in the ocean compared to the 
great mass. The Lady Paula is commemorated, who, 
having divided the chief part of her possessions 



RELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. ^37 

amongst her children, made a most elaborate and 
toilsome pilgrimage, not merely to Jerusalem, but to 
every spot celebrated as the abode, or marked by the 
visit of apostle, or saint, or holy prophet After a 
three years' pilgrimage, she returned to Bethlehem, 
where she founded a monastery, and also built a hos- 
pital for the reception of poor travellers. There she 
died. 

A touching instance I have read also of a young 
man named Raymond of Placentia, in whom the 
yearning to go to Jerusalem was keen, but he con- 
cealed and endeavoured to stifle it, out of considera- 
tion to the feelings of his mother. It was not to be 
so overcome, however. How willing soever might be 
the mind to martyrize the will, the body gave way. 
He became seriously, dangerously, overwhelmingly 
ill, and the treasured secret escaped him and became 
known to the parent from whom he had so carefully 
concealed it 

Her first comment to him is beautiful — 

' I am a widow, and I may imitate the example of 
Saint Anne, who, in her widowhood, quitted not the 
Temple of Jerusalem, neither day nor night.' 

So she journeyed to the Holy Land in the com- 
pany of her SOIL 

There was a heart-stirring spirit of religion abroad 



«38 GOD'S ACHE. 

then, which required its votaries to be cUrniff, to be 
actively, earnestly, practically employed in some tan- 
gible religious act The lady about to give an heir 
to a lordly house, or who was anxious for the prospect 
of doing so, would earnestly seek Heavenly help and 
saintly interposition, by some practical and ostensible 
act of religion— prayer, suppHcation, and adoration ; 
and, be it added, seldom would she, on the accom- 
plishment of her wish, fan to offer her thanksgivings 
at the same shrine which had heretofore witnessed 
her anxious appeal. And this custom had a prece- 
dent of powerful influence in the case of the Hebrew 
matron Hannah, the mother of Samuel, the prophet 
and judge of Israel 

Whither should she go then, this devout, this 
earnest but domestic English matron? and many a 
poorer sister of equally humble heart, and equally 
high aspirations? To Jerusalem? — ^to Rome? — to 
Compostella ? Nay ; rather to our Lady's shrine at 
Walsingham ; to the tomb of the Venerable erudite 
Bede ; of the sainted Cuthbert at Durham ; the mar- 
tyred Becket at Canterbury ; or the pious Saint Ed- 
ward at Westminster. 

Better still, to some holy, purifying Well. Yes, 
most probably so. It was customary formerly to erect 
a Cross at a roadside well — the pure and sparkling 
stream which ^rang and bubbled up, as it were, to 



J 



EELICfS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. 2^9 

meet and refresh the toil-worn pedestrian on hid 
course ; — it was usual, I say, to erect a cross to mark 
the spot, to invite to rest, to incite to prayer. The 
cross, of cQurse, on its erection, was sprinkled with 
holy water, and dedicated to some saint or martyr. 

But — ^wondrous as it appeared then — it was found 
that in many instances these waters had purifying 
virtues ; they did remove ailment ; they did invigo- 
rate weakness. They were, in fact and efiFect, such 
chalybeates as are common and understood in our 
day, and are commonly resorted to by invalids. It 
was not so then. Before Chemistry was bom, when 
medical science was little known, these medicinal 
virtues, so plainly and indisputably ostensible, were 
attributed to the beneficence of the saint or angel to 
whom the spring had been dedicated. An angel did 
come down daily to trouble the waters of the fountain 
at Bethesda. 

Here was Scriptural authority for the illusion, for 
the belief in the beneficent interposition of saints and 
angels at consecrated springs and fountains. 

At least, a pilgrimage taken, a penance endured, 
a privation sought under any circumstances, with 
humble and earnest hope, and prayer, and self- 
sacrifice, must redound with benefit to the heart and 
spirit of the penitent, be his creed what it may. 

Then, as I have said, these were not times of 



240 GOD S ACBE. 

thonghty readiDg, reflection, and theoTj; they were 
times when religion itself most be tangible, active, 
energetic, demonstrative. 

And it is no wonder that errors ensacKl, as they 
did; that cormptions arose, increased, and were 
sanctioued by common belief as they were. If the 
cosdy and superb offerings at sach shrines as Socket's, 
Cathbert's, Bede's, excite our wonder, a softer feeling 
is awakened on considering that^ in consequence of 
health and benefit received, the rheumatized pauper, 
who perchance had bathed in such a hotspring as 
Matiock or Buxton now enshrines in marble, and 
invites through her titled physicians the rich and 
wealthy to try ; or the worn-out half-fed serf, feeling 
absolute invigoration from draughts of some chaly- 
beate, then springing unknown in the wild, now 
' advertised' over half Europe— is it wonderful, I say, 
that their utter ignorance and their fervid faith com- 
bined, should lead them to pay duteous homage there ; 
and — ^all they could — ^to hang up and leave their now 
unrequired bandages and wrappings as an offering of 
gratitude to the Saint of the Spring ? 



EELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. ^41 

Note to Page 224, 
Mr, Warhurton*8 Description of the Approach to Jerusalem, 

* The hills became more and more precipitous as we approached 
Jerusalem ; most of them were of a conical form, and terraced 
to their summit. Yet, on these steep acclivities the strenuous 
labour of the Israelite had formerly grown com, and wine, and 
oil ; and on the terrace that remained uninjured, the few present 
inhabitants still plant wheat, aud vineyards, and olive groves* 

* The pathway continued as rough as ever, while we wound 
through the rocky defiles leading to the upper plains ; but it was 
much more frequented, and I had joined a large and various 
company, for the sake of listening to their talk about the city 
that now absorbed every other interest. At each acclivity we 
surmounted, we were told that the next would reveal to us the 
object of our destination ; and at length, as we emerged upon a 
wild and sterile plain, the leading pilgrims sank upon their 
Knees — a contagious shout of enthusiasm burst from the excited 
wanderers ; and every man of that large company — Arab, Italian, 
Greek, and Englishman — exclaimed, each in his own tongue, *E1 
Khuds !' — * Gerusalemme V — ;* Hagiopolis !* — * The Holy City !' 

* It was indeed Jerusalem, — and had the Holy City risen be- 
fore us in its palmiest days of magnificence and glory, it could 
;not have created deeper emotion, or' been gazed at more earnestly 
or with intenser interest. 

* So long the object of eager hope and busy imagination, it 
stood before me at length in actual reality : the city of David — 
the chosen seat of God — the death-place of his Son — the object 
of the world's pilgrimage for two thousand years. All its his- 
tory, so strangely blended with holiness and crime, with pro- 
sperity and desolation, with triumph and despair ; and a thousand 
associations came thronging into recollection, peopling its towers 
and surrounding plains with the scenes and actors of long event- 

R 






242 GOD S ACRE. 

fal years. These feelings I shared in common with the hamhiest 
pilgrim that was kneeling there, and in some respects he had 
even the advantage of me ; he had made infinitely greater sacri- 
fices than I had done, and undergone far heavier toils to reach 
that bourne. Undistracted by mere temporal associations, he 
only saw the sacred spot wherein the Prophets preached and 
David sung, and Christ had died. 

' The whole cavalcade paused simultaneously when Jerusalem 
appeared in view ; the greater number fell upon their knees and 
laid their foreheads in the dust, whilst a profound silence, more 
impressive than the loudest acclamations, prevailed over all: 
even the Moslems gazed reverently on what was to them also a 
holy city, and recalled to mind the pathetic appeal of their fore- 
father — * Hast thou not a blessing for me, also, O my &ther ?' 

* When the crusading army, thinned by pestilence, privation, 
and many a battle-field, gazed upon the view before us, that war- 
rior host knelt down as a single man; sobs burst from their 
mailed bosoms, and tears streamed down their rugged cheeks.' 
Those tears, and not the blood so profusely shed upon the plains 
of Palestine, were the true evidences of the crusading spirit. 

' Apart from all associations, the first view of Jerusalem is a 
most striking one. A brilliant and unchequered sunshine has 
something mournful in it, when all that it shines upon is utterly 
desolate and drear. Not a tree or a green spot is visible ; no 
sign of life breaks the solemn silence; no smile of nature's glad 
ness ever varies the stem scenery around. The flaming, mono- 
tonous sunshine above, and the pale, distorted, rocky wastes be* 
neath, realize but too painfully the prophetic picture — * Thy sky 
shall be brass, and thy land shall be iron.' To the right and left, 
as far as the eye can reach, vague undulations of colourless rocks 
extend to the horizon. A broken and desolate plain in front ii* 
bounded by a wavy, battlemented wall, over which towers frowL 



' See ante, page 224, from Tasso, 



BELICS, SHRINES, AND PILGRIMAGE. 243 

and minarets peer, and mosque domes swell ; intermingled with 
churcli turrets and an undistinguishable mass of terraced roo&. 
High over the city, to the left, rises the Mount of Olives ; and 
the distant hills of Moab, almost mingling with the sky, afford a 
background to the striking picture. 

* There was something startlingly new and strange in that wild, 
shadowless landscape ; the clear outline of the hills and the city 
walls — so colourless, yet so well defined against the naked sky — 
gave to the whole a most unreal appearance ; it resembled rather 
an immense mezzotinto engraving than anything that nature and 
nature's complexion had to do with. 

' I am not sure that this stern scenery did not present the 
only appearance that would not disappoint expectation. It is 
unlike anything else on earth — so blank to the eye, yet so full of 
meaning to the heart ; every mountain round it familiar to the 
memory ; even yon blasted fig-tree has a voice, and the desola- 
tion that surrounds us bears silent testimony to fearful expe- 
riences. 

' The plain upon which we stand looks like the arena of deadly 
struggles in times gone by — struggles in which all the mighty 
nations of the earth took part, and in which Nature herself seems 
to have shared. 

* Each of our party had waited for the other to finish his devo- 
tions, and seemed to respect each pilgrim's feelings with a 
Christian courtesy, perhaps inspired by the spot. At length all 
had risen from their genuflexions andprostrations, and we moved 
slowly forward over the rugged yet slippery path which human 
feet had. worn in the solid rock. Countless had been the makers 
of that path — Jebusites, Hebrews, Chaldaeans, Assyrians, Egyp- 
tians, Romans, Saracens, Crusaders, and pilgrims from every 
country under heaven.' 



R a 



CHAPTER X, 

FLOWERS OK GBAYES. 

God Almightj first planted a garden ; and, indeed, it is the 
purest of human pleasures. It is the greatest re&eshment to the 
spirit of man« Bacon, 

God's own monuments, the flowers, whidi call to our minds 
the death, or rather the sleep, of the seeds. 

The meanest weed of the garden senreth unto many uses— 
Every green herh, from the lotus to the darnel. 
Is rich frith delicate suds to help incurious man, 

TT has been said that for every disease incident to 
-*- humanity, nature has in herself provided a remedy, 
in ' simples of a thousand names' with ^ strange and 
vigorous faculties/ did man understand exactly where 
to seek for, and how to apply them. This idea, 
worthy of Divine beneficence, does not seem at all in- 
consistent with the general scope of the Creator's 
an:£iDgement8, nor with the scheme of nature, so 
far as we understand it Many are the instances 
known of the deadly poison and the healing balm 
growing side by side. The Indian knows where to 
pluck the herb which draws the fatal venom from the 
Bting of the snake ; and it is known also that such 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. ^45 

anodyne abounds most or perhaps grows only in the 
localities in which the reptile is found. The savage 
poisons his arrows or his spear with the juice of a 
deadly plant, fatal to the stranger ; but the savage of 
the same neighbourhood knows where to seek the 
antidote. 

It is indeed most true, that in this material world 
we may everywhere, if we so please, 

Find tongues in trees, books in the ronning brooks^ 
Sermons in stones, and good in everything. 

On the verge of illimitable deserts, where no grain 
can rise, or scarcely any other tree can grow, the date- 
palm flourishes abundantly; suflGicient in itself for 
the needs of human life. The cow-trees of South 
America, the shea-trees of Africa, yield their milk 
and butter where these necessaries could not other- 
wise be procured. The snake-master plant, of the 
Far West, the roots of which, sliced and laid on the 
wound, are an antidote to the sting of the deadliest 
snake, grows freely, as we have said, in localities 
where that reptile most abounds. 

Of the water-melon, that most desired of refresh- 
ments to a parched overworn traveller, everybody 
knows that by the goodness of Providence it grows 
in the driest soil, and flourishes luxuriantly in hot 
sandy deserts. So, where other refreshment is none, 



0,46 god's acee. 

the hialf-fainting traveller may slake his thirst and 
recruit his worn frame even by the wild fruits cluster- 
ing on the lonely and weary desert track. 

So in South America, we read of an old traveller 
— ' For food we had fruits as much as we could find, 
and water we got from the leaves of certain lilies^ 
which grew on the bark of trees, which I found by 
seeing the monkeys drink at them/ 

Nay, at the moment I frame these pages, the com- 
mencement of the war with Russia, when thousands 
of our countrymen are about to brave those ' more 
deadly foes than the Russians,' fever and dysentery, we 
read — ' As in all probability Quinine, from its high 
price, will be confined solely to hospital practice, or 
to the dressing-case of the officers, it maybe advisable 
to let the soldiers know on disembarking at Gallipoli, 
&c., that in the Tnarshes and on the borders of the 
numerous lakes, there grows a herb which, cceteris 
paribus, wiU prove their segis or sheet-anchor, being 
both a preventive and cure of diseases arising from 
marsh miasmata : it is the sweet-scented flag (cala- 
mus aromaticusy 

The writer suggests that each man should have a 
handful of the roote in his knapsack, chewing it daily, 
or powdering and mixing it with his beverage.^ 

Dr. Graves, in the Times of April 26, 1854. 






FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 2^J 

. When the army of Charlemagne was seized by the 
plague on march in Italy, it was found that in that 
very locality a herb, an excellent remedy for the 
disease, grew in profusion — the herb Carolina^ It 
abounds in the district now. 

I believe that the word ' Paradise,' symbolical all 
the Christian world over of uncorrupted beauty and 
excellence, literally signifies a garden — 

When earth by angel feet was trod. 
One great garden of her God ; 

and in nothing may the wisdom and beneficence of 
our Creator be more admirably, or, to my ideas, so 
beautifully exemplified as in the arboral and floral 
productioDs lavished over the wide earth. The omi- 
thologist would say otherwise, and would illustrate 
his theory in the display of birdal philosophy. The 
entomologist wouldtake another sphere of illustration ; 
the geologist another ; he who dives into the riches 
and wonders of the ocean another ; the astronomer, 
who brings all the arcana of science to aid his con- 
templation of the stars, another. What do they all 
prove but * the depth of the riches both of the wisdom 
and knowledge of Ood ! how unsearchable are His 
judgments, and His ways past finding out !' 

Man, in his finite capacity, would deduce every 
lesson from, the minute circle in which his own peculiar 



248 ood's acre* 

iresearcfies have revolved t the lessons which God 
Almighty displays are deep as the ocean, lofty as th^ 
sky, boundless as the wide earth. They are to be 
discerned as plainly in the twinkle of a daisy in the 
grass, as in the blaze of a comet in the sky ; in the 
noiseless fall of a sparrow, as in the thunder of an 
avalanche ; in the gentle beneficent dew that moistens 
a drooping flower, as in the hurricane which desolates 
a kingdom and hurls thousands to ruin or deatL 
And not more easily does the mariner steer his course 
over the trackless waves, by the sun by day and the 
everlasting stars by night, than the solitary wanderer 
on the boundless prairies of the New World defines 
his certain route to a lonely station, a thousand miles 
away, by the presence or absence of a single flowen 

Look at this delicate flower that lifts its head from the meadow, 
See how its leaves all point to the north, as true as the magnet ; 
It is the compass flower f that the finger of God has suspended 
Here on its fragile stalk, to direct the traveller's journey 
Over the sea-like, pathless, limitless waste of the desert. 

It is in such tokens of His power that many love 
to trace the omniscient care of the Father and 
Creator of all : to deduce proofs of His beneficence, to 
learn lessons of love and humility, to adore His mercy 
and revere His power. Very especially indeed are 
such lessons learnt from the flowers which spring at 
our feet, the trees which shelter our path. 



FLOWERS Olt GRAVES* 249 

Wondrous ixuths, and manifold as wondrousi 

God hath written in those stars above ; 
But not less in the bright flowerets under us 

Stands the revelation of his love. 

In all places then, and in all seasons, 

Flowers expand their light and soul-like wings. 

Teaching us, by most persuasive reasons. 
How akin thej are to human things. 

And with childlike, credulous affection. 

We behold their tender buds expand ; 
Emblems of our own great resurrection. 

Emblems of the bright and better land. 

The foregoing lines are very beautiful, and as truth- 
ful as beautiful. Where can there be more eloquent 
teachers than flowers? Our Saviour explicitly re- 
ferred to the lily of the field to illustrate one of his 
lessons. It seems to me not easy to watch flowers 
habitually — I do not mean in the Jardinifere or in 
the drawing-room Conservatory — but the flower in its 
home, the field, the hedgeside, or the mountain — » 
without remarking some allusion in their progress to 
things of earth and heaven, of life and death, of time 
and eternity — without reading Hope in their daily 
brightening to maturity, from the time of the first 
shooting of the bud ; Gratitude in their evident im- 
provement after a refreshing shower, or a cherishing 
sunbeam ; and * mute teachers' though they be, there 
is something that whispers oi Patience in their silent, 



250 .god's acre. 

gradual decay. St. Paul illustrated the most sublime 
and most comforting tenet of the Christian belief by 
reference to a blade of com springing from the ground; 
and our faith in this tenet may be renewed and 
strengthened with each revolving year, if we do but 
observe the sure reappearance of our floral pets, 
months after their total disappearance and apparent 
extinction. 

What patient 'perseverance in well-doing' may 
we not also read in their yearning for and reaching 
to the light, even under the most unpropitious in- 
fluences ; like a good man struggling through sick- 
ness and sorrow to his lofty hope and aim. It is a 
very prosaic illustration to speak of nasturtiums 
planted in the dark holes called areas, in the dismal 
London houses ; yet this will prove the fact to many 
not conversant with flowers in their happier and na- 
tural homes. At Brighton more especially, I have 
sometimes in my lonely walks — one instance I most 
especially remember — been startled by the sight of 
flowers, not the domestic, free, home-growing nastur- 
tium, but daintier plants, appearing where (to garble 
an old ballad) — 

'Naejlower shuld hae been ; 

and I found it, on search and inquiry, to proceed 
from a plant in a dismal depth, and utterly denuded 
even of leaves until it reached the light The most 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 25 1 

luxuriant and beautiful passion-tree I ever saw in my 
life, bearing freely golden fruit amidst its profusion of 
mystic flowers — in a happier atmosphere than Brigh- 
ton, no doubt — sprang from the depths of an area in 
a fashionable terrace. Sprang — ^yearningly, untirr 
ingly, sprang to the light which to it brought beauty, 
bloom, and fruition?- 

Flowers are as suggestive as the industrious spider 
to Bruce,^ as instructive as the hungry mouse to Dio- 
genes, and as comforting as the daily sight of his 
tamed spider to Pellico in his solitary prison, with the 
beneficent addition of being in themselves beautiful 
and attractive. 

How touching is the reference to, and how beau- 
tiful and beneficent is the lesson which Mungo Park 
deduces from a flower, when he was himself in the 
extremity of desolation. 

In one part of his journey homewards, when on 
his way from the romantic village of Kooma to 

^ Miss Martineau remarked in one of the most tomblike recesses 
of Petra a large fig-tree, covered with green fruit, still climbing 
to the light. 

' Oh that I were an orange-tree, 
That busy plant ! 
Then should I always laden be, 

And never want 
Some fruit for him that dresseth me. 

G. Hebbebt. 



25^ CK)DS ACRE. 

Sibidooloo, he vras robbed and stripped of all bis 
clothes, and left solitary in the wilderness, in the 
rainy season, five hundred miles distant from the 
nearest European settlement, and on the very brink 
of despondency ; no alternative seemed to remain but 
to lie down and die. He thus depicts his thoughts 
upon seeing a moss in flower : — 

* I was indeed a stranger in a strange land ; yet I 
was still under the protecting eye of that Providence 
who has condescended to call himself the stranger s 
friend. At this moment, painful as my reflections 
were, the extraordinary beauty of a small moss, in 
fructification, irresistibly caught my eye. I mention 
this to show from what trifling circumstances the 
mind will sometimes derive consolation ; for though 
the whole plant was not larger than the top of one of 
my fingers, I could not contemplate the delicate con- 
formation of its roots, leaves, and capsula, without 
admiration. Can that Being (thought I) who planted, 
watered, and brought to perfection, in this obscure 
part of the world, a thing which appears of so small 
importance, look with unconcern upon the situation 
and sufferings of creatures formed after his own 
image ? Surely not ! Beflections like these would not 
allow me to despair. I started up, and disregarding 
both hunger and fatigue, travelled forwards, assured 
that relief was at hand ; and I was not disappointed/ 



^^■- 



n 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES, 2^3 

It was a similar feeling which excited, in happier 
circumstances^ the enthusiasm of LinnaBUs, who, when 
he first saw our English Downs all aflame with the 
golden flowers of the furze, knelt down and thanked 
God for having made anything so beautiful. 

The endless variety of flowers, and their exquisite 
and indescribable beauty too, even in this our sin- 
defiled earth, where, as we are told, the whole crea- 
tion, animate and inanimate, has suffered, and is in- 
jured in consequence of the first great trespass! 
What must flowers have been in Paradise ? Unques- 
tionably they are our most beautiful type of it 

Unconscious of sin, of guile, of evil, flowers appear 
on earth but to fulfil their Creator's will in contribut- 
ing to the pleasures of His creatures ; and this part 
fulfilled, they yield up their ' sweet lives/ Yet, mute 
witnesses of the first sin, they might not escape the 
penalty, and there is nothing inconsistent in the idea 
that their beauty was dimmed, and their glory ob- 
scured by thorns, thistles, and venomous plants, which 
then first sprang, and in Paradise had been unknown. 

The following distich is, perhaps, as truthful as it 

is quaint : — - 

Before man's fall the rose was bom, 
St. Ambrose says, without the thorn ;' 
But, for man's fault, then was the thorn. 
Without the fragrant rosebud, born ; 
But ne'er the rose without the thorn. 



^54 GODS AC&E. 

All creation was imbued with the taint of the first 
sin — flowers, it would seem, least of alL * Kill and 
eat,' is a motto of universal application. For to speak 
not of tigers and crocodiles, the most sparkling and 
beautiful of Nature's fairy broods have a tinge of 
cannibalism about them. But flowers, though they 
beautify and refresh the earth, and afibrd nutriment 
for million tribes of devourers, make no depredation 
in return. *The dews of Heaven and Providence' 
support them, and in requital, they silently and gra- 
ciously exhale, throughout their short lives, odorous 
incense and grateful perfume.^ 

Is it any wonder then that flowers should have been 
used in all the ceremonies and pageants, of almost 
all nations, from the cradle to the grave ? that they 
should have been adopted as emblems of joy, as sym- 
bols of mourning, as trophies of triumph, as tokens of 
highest honour, as guerdons of rich reward ? In all 
times, flowers have been considered as fitting accom- 
paniments to the varied drama of life. Emblems of 
triumph, they have been wreathed around the con- 
queror's brow, and flung in his path. Typical of 



' We do not' forget the camiYorous vegetables — ^the Sph4Bria 
Hobertsii, and others of its class ; not to speak of the Dioncsa 
muscipula and the like. Bat sorely these may be regarded as 
the ' exceptions which prove the role.' 



^^- 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 2^^ 

gaiety and gladness, they were infused in the purple 
juice, or they encircled the wine-cup, and added to the 
brilliancy of the feast; they adorned the sacrifices 
and crowned the altars of the gods. The most po- 
lished nation in the world considered a crown of 
parsley the most flattering of tributes : by them 
literally, " and in our times metaphorically, the sub 
lira est poet is wreathed with bay. 

Ever giving token of the mighty hand by which 
they grow, the application of them alters not with the 
overthrow of nations, or the downfal of thrones. We 
indeed decorate not the temples of heathen gods, 
but at festival seasons our Christian temples are en- 
riched by them. In chastened joy, we place their 
radiant blossoms on the brow of the blooming bride, 
and deck her path to the altar with them ; and 'as 
one of the last, so one of the holiest offices of love,' 
in humble hope we strew them on the bier of the 
early dead, or hang a garland near the empty place 
in church to commemorate the dearly loved, the too 
early mourned. That ' gentle and beautiful thing,' 
the pale snowdrop, meek emblem of consolation, rising 
in beauty amid the chills of winter from its grave, 
placed on the bier of the youth or maiden early sum- 
moned, carries its mute but cheering lesson to the 
heart of the mourner ; or the rose, sleeping in perfume, 
intimates, not darkly, the comfort which the memory 



^wrrmwwr^mmm^iw^^i 



256 god's acre, 

of a good man's actions may diffuse even after he is 
laid low. For, though this sweet flower is chiefly ap* 
propriated to lovers, the red rose is not unfrequently 
displayed in commemoration of persons in more 
advanced life, who have been remarkable for bene^ 
volence, 

I have seen much of the use and application of 
flowers in country rural festivals and observances, but 
I think the most beautiful illustration I ever read 
of their adaptability to the common enjoyments and 
circumstances of life, is that given by Shakspeare, in 
Perdita's distribution of them at the sheep-shearing 
feast. To the two elderly visitors she says — • 

Beverend Sirs, 
For yovi there's rosemary, and rue ; these keep 
Seetning and savour all the winter long : 
Grace and remembrance be to you both, 
And welcome to our shearing. 

Polixenes replies-^ 

Shepherdess 
(A fair one are you), well you fit our ages 
With flowers of winter. 

To others, not so old, she says — 

Here's flowers for you ; 
Hot lavender, mint, savory, marjoram ; 
The marigold that goes to bed with the sun. 
And with him rises weeping : these are flowers 
Of middle summer, and, I ihink, they are given 
To men of middle age. You are very welcome. 



FLOWERS ON GEAVES. 257 

But to compliment her young friends, and espe- 
ciaUy her lover, she wishes fof flowers of sp2g. 
daffodils, violets, dim pale primroses, &;c., in that 
well-known apostrophe, beginning — 

Proserpina, 
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall 
From Dis's waggon. 

At a time when the really beneficent properties 
appertaining to the floral and vegetable kingdom 
were little known, it is no wonder that not only 
marvellous, but magical influences, were attributed 
to some of them. It is the belief of the vulgar to 
this day, that the lightning will not scare, nor the 
thunderbolt strike, any one who shelters beneath the 
branches of a bay-tree ; and it was a superstitious 
custom of the ancients to keep a bay-leaf in their 
mouths, to preserve themselves from misfortune or 
pollution. 

The Greeks had great faith in the magical proper- 
ties of plants. When the enchantress Circe had 
turned the followers of Ulysses into swine, Hermes 
pointed out to the majestic wanderer a 

Sovereign plant. 
Where on the all-hearing earth nnmarked it grew, 

the juice of which restored his degraded followers to 
their wonted shape. 

8 



258 god's acbe. 

There can be little doubt perhaps that from this 

Moly, 
That Hennes once to wise Uljsses gave, 

Milton has drawn the idea of that ^ hoemony' 

Of Bov'reign use, 
'Chunst all enchantments, mildew, black, or damp. 
Or ghastly furies' apparition, 

which he has turned to such admirable effect in his 
beautiful Masque of Coraus; and perhaps to the 
same, or at least to some similar inspiration, was 
Shakspeare indebted for the idea of that little flower, 
called * Love-in-idleness,' the juice of which laid on 
the sleeping eyelids caused so many of the per- 
plexities of the Midsurn/mer Night's Dream; whilst 
the antidote, a flower also, had power to dispel the 
illusion. 

Sought for in every pageant of life, from the cradle 
to the tomb, flowers seem particularly adapted to, 
and have been almost universally used in, the cere- 
monies of the latter. Among the classical nations, 
the tokens of death being in a house were branches 
of pine and cypress suspended near the threshold; 
and Lycurgus ordered laurel leaves^ as part of the 

^ Or bay, the Laurus of the ancients. The tree we now call 
laurel was unknown to them. 



FLOWEBS ON GRAVES. ^59 

funeral habit of persons of merit, and garlands of 
flowers were cast on the body as it passed to in- 
terment. When Augustus surveyed the body of 
Alexander the Great, on reclosing the tomb he 
placed a crown of gold on the head of the corpse, 
and scattered a profusion of freshly-gathered flowers 
over the whole. 

Tombs were strewed with flowers, especially roses, 
which both by Romans and Greeks were used in 
profusion : roses, lilies, hyacinths, parsley and myrtle 
' were customary ; and by the Greeks the Amaranth 
waa much esteemed, being considered, as its name 
imports, unfading, immortal — 

A flower whicli once 
In Paradise, fast by the tree of life, . . 
Began to bloom. 

The flowers of one variety of this plant, indi- 
genous to Sumatra, retain their freshness and beauty 
for some years after they are gathered. Homer 
describes the Thessalians as wearing crowns of 
amaranths at the funeral of Achilles. But how far 
nobler is Milton's lofty strain. Of the angels he 

says: — 

Lowly reverent 

Towards either throne they bow, and to the ground, 

With solemn adoration, down they cast 

Their crowns, inwove with amarant and gold ; 

Immortal amarant, a flower which once 

S 7, 



26o god's agbe. 

In Paradise, fast by the tree of life. 

Began to bloom; bat soon for man's offence 

To heaven remoyed, .where first it gprew, there grows. 

And flowers aloft, shading the fount of life. 

And where the river of bliss through midst of heaven 

Bolls o'er Elysian flowers her amber stream ; 

With these, that never Aide, the spirits elect 

Bind their resplendent locks, inwreath'd with beams. 

The Asphodel was a sacred flower;, devoted to the 
deity who presided over life, death, and sepulchral 
rites. Milton has made beautiful use of the super- 
stitious attaching to it, in causing the nymph 
Sabrina, when she threw herself into the Severn, to 
be bathed 

In nectar'd lavers, strew'd with asphodel 

till she revived. 

And underwent a quick immortal change.. 

They are spoken of as the food of the dead about 
the Elysian fields — 

Where souls unbodied dwell 
In ever-flowering meads of asphodel. 

If I mistake not, the flower was used in divina- 
tion by the British Druids. 

It is said that the absolute repudiation of every- 
thing appertaining to paganism, which marked the 
first days of Christianity, induced the early Christians 
to discontinue the use even of flowers. But this was 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 261 

■ 

only for a short time. Very soon were they used 
abundantly, and the practice has never since been 
entirely laid agide in any Christian country. It has, 
indeed, in some country parts fallen into desuetude ; 
so much so, that on a marked occasion the use of 
them by the writer was deprecated, because *the 
people about would think it was papistical/ 

Few will be so hardy as to ascribe any tinge of 
papistry to Milton. Listen to him : — 

Return, Sicilian muse. 
And call the vales, and bid them hither cast 
Their bells and flowerets of a thousand hues. 
Ye valleys low, where the mild whispers use 
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks, 
On whose fresh lap the swart star sparely looks ; 
Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes 
That on the green leaf suck the honey'd showers, 
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers. 
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies. 
The tufbed crowtoe, and pale jessamine. 
The white pink, and the pansy freak'd with jet, 
The glowing violet. 

The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine. 
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head. 
And every flower that sad embroidery wears : 
Bid amaranthus all his beauty shed. 
And daffodillies fill their cups with tears. 

And, reader, for what was all this beautiful pomp 
of preparation destined, but 

To strew the laureate hearse where Lycid lies. 



a62. god's acbk 

The foregoing pages might almost be stigmatized 
as * flowers of poetry \ but it is with difficulty I have 
refrained from quoting far more largely. 

Flowers, not less tokens of the shortness of life 
than emblems of resurrection, and evergreens a type 
of immortality, have always been customary and 
fitting adornments of the Christian church, especially 
on the festivals of Christmas and Easter. 

*The innocent and expressive, and at the same 
time beautiful ornament of flowers,' says a reverend 
author, 'was not forgotten by the ancient Christians 
in the decoration of their churches, but especially 
their altars. St. Augustine particularly mentions 
this custom, when he notices the renunciation of 
paganism for Christianity by the expiring Martialis, 
whose son-in-law, after praying with much fervour 
at the foot of St. Stephen's altar, approached as he 
was going away, and carried off from it some of the 
flowers that were placed there, and conveyed them 
to the couch of his dying relative. St Jerome 
particularly panegyrizes his friend Nepotian for his 
devotional assiduity in adorning the walls of the 
church with a variety of flowers and the boughs of 
trees ; and St. Faulinus of Nola refers to the same 
practice when he describes the manner of celebrating 
the annual festival of his patron saint.' 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 263 

If we bear in mind how plants^ and fruits, and 
flowers were not only placed in the Tabernacle of 
the Israelites, but were prescribed as offerings there, 
by the Almighty's especial command, we shall not 
be surprised that the Christian Church sanctions 
similar tributes. For instance, the palm-branch, 
though it might possibly originally have been 
gathered for shade by the pedestrians in a hot 
country, was yet, mindless of personal relief, cast 
down in the path of our blessed Lord, and accepted 
by him. Therefore do we, just upon Easter, display 
such substitu];es as in England we can procure for 
these palms — signs of victory, emblem of the peace- 
ful triumph of the King of Kings and Lord of 
Lords. A foreign branch of the Church Catholic 
devotes one portion of her temporal domains, in a 
more propitious cHmate — a hot, sandy valley on the 
coast of Genoa — entirely to the culture of the real 
palm for the service of the sanctuary. In Valencia 
too, old and lofty palm-trees shade the shore of 
Alicant, and the branches are yearly thinned and 
sent to Rome for use in the Church. 

Those old Rogation days, which are now chiefly 
associated in our minds with perambulating the 
Parish bounds, were anciently observed with solemn 
pomp of Cross and Banner, as priests and people 
slowly passed through the green waving corn, or 



3,64 god's ACB£. 

amid rich orchards teeming with fruit and blossom^ 
charting Litanies, or oflfering up joyful hymns of 
praise and thanksgiving to God for the blessings of 
the earth, now so apparent on her bosom. These 
processions, like many other originally beneficial 
institutions, led to abuse, and so were abolished at 
the Eeformation; but the Benediction of new fruits 
took place on the Feast of the Ascension, of orchards 
on the Festival of St. James the Apostle, and of new 
grapes on the day of St. Xystus, and oflferings of 
them were always made in the church. * It seems 
very clear,' says Bingham, ' that the offering of first 
fruits was a very ancient and general custom in the 
Christian Church, and that this also contributed 
something toward the maintenance of the clergy/ 

The most superficial reader of Holy Scripture must 
remember how, as I have just remarked, the offer- 
ing, in their Temple, of fruits of the earth and flowers, 
was made incumbent on the Jews by the fiat of God. 

We have the authority of Sacred Writ, too, for 
considering the olive the type of abundance, the 
lily of purity. Our blessed Saviour gave us in the 
vine a type of His Church, in the fig-tree of His 
coming ; and He bade us ^ mark the flowers of the 
field, how they grow.' 

Considering this divine sanction, we cannot be sur- 
prised that flowers should have been used as emhlema 




'^^^'^^^^^^'"^^^^^f'^ammmmmmgmmmmmvmv^ 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. 26^ 

to a considerable extent. We do not refer to mere 
secular types, adopted from the imaginative people 
of the East, indicating passion by a tulip, love by a 
rose, where the myrtle and cypress and poppy are 
enwreathed to denote despair, the bergamotte and 
jasmine to betoken the sweets of friendship, or the 
acacia^ of chaste love, &c. &c. 

But it was no linholy feeling which referred the 
eternal quiver of the aspen leaf to the then supposed 
fiEict of our Saviour's cross having been made of that 
tree, and therefore that from that moment the leaves 
have trembled — can never rest.* There is a pretty 
superstition, that the dark spots on the leaf of the 
arum were caused by a few drops of the Saviour's 
blood falling on the plant ; there is a prettier, which 
attributes to the same cause the colour of the robin's 
breast, it having chanced to nestle at the foot of the 
cross. 

The hawthorn, called aubepine, or morning of the 
year, called also noble thorn, as supposing it to have 

. ^ This Acacia Bobinia was called Locust-tree by the early mis- 
sionaries, who would create a belief that St. John was supported 
in the Wilderness by the fruit of this tree. 

^ We were told in our youth, by a man skilled in herbs and 
simples, who begged to be allowed to gather in our garden some 
St. John's wort by moonlight, its 'hour of power,' that the 
crucifixion tree was the elderberry, which as it became K>ld grew 
frightfully ugly, ' the fowest tree in a' the forest/ from that cause. 



266 god"^ agrk 

been the thorny crown of Christ, is traditioned, 
from that circomstance doubtless, to have the power 
of oonnteracting poison, while he who bears a 
branch shall be unscathed in thunder ; as also that 
no malevolent spirit can enter the place where it 
may be. 

That would be surely a right and truthful senti- 
ment which would cause ' the wise of heart' watch- 
ing the snowdrop — so fragile and so pure — ^noiselessly, 
patiently, but surely, making its way through a bed 
of snow in the inclemency of the winter, to point to 
it and to use it as an emblem of consolation. It 
was dedicated from its purity to the blessed Virgin. 
Even that holiest of all created women was not dis- 
honoured by the ascription. Many a young child 
has been taught quickly by the passion-flower that 
history of his Saviour, which could not otherwise 
have been impressed without weary lessons. From 
the scarlet pimpernel, the 'cheerful pimpernel,' the 
' poor man's weatherglass,' as it is commonly called, 
how well was he taught precaution and foresight ; 
from the sunflower, and aU its numerous class, 

which 

Turn to their God, when he sets. 

The same look which they tnm'd when he rose, 

faithful gratitude to the bestower of life and warmth. 
From the day's eye, or common daisy, and myriad 



MiOWERS ON GRAVES. S,6j 

other flowers which open cheerily in a moming^ 
and in the evening fold their leaves and droop, * as 
if in prayer/ (and who shall assert they are not T) 
was taught the duty of morning thanksgiving, the 
necessity of evening supplication. Nature herself, 
not the Church, taught the infant who, having been 
accustomed to watch an acacia-tree, would not go to 
bed. He said, * it was not bedtime, for the acacia- 
tree had not begun its prayers.' 

I think a not less interesting, though a noisier 
remembrancer, is the even-song of the birds, gra- 
dually subsiding to a faint twitter, as if overcome by 
drowsiness before the last appointed canticle was 
fairly enunciated. As to their jubilant morning 
strains, they can inspire but one feeling — 

Let eyerything that hath breath praise the Lord.^ 
Time would fail us to pursue this thema It is 



^ It was the cnstom ' in elder times, when merriments were/ 
for all ranks to go a maying ; and, says an old writer, ' On May- 
day eyery man, except impediment, would walk into the sweet 
meadows and green woods, there to rejoice their spirits with the 
beauty and sayour of sweet flowers, and with the noise of birds 
praidng Ghd in their hind* 

Again, take a yerse from Herbert- 
Hark, how the birds do sing. 
And woods do ring ! 



1 

I 



268 god's agbe. 

well known that the Church was the beneficent 
parent of agriculture in England. It is very easy to 
say, as it is very commonly said, that monks and 
churchmen were knowing fellows, always picking the 
fat of the land and settling themselves in the 
choicest parts. The reverse is more true. Some of 
their sites were very beautiful, and perhaps naturally 
luxuriant; how utterly otherwise many were there 
are yet ruins existent to testify. The truth is, that 
the talent, the science, the skill, and the industry of 
the Church being brought into full action, they did 
really * cause the wilderness and the solitary place to 
blossom as the rose.' 

Nor were their skill and energy brought to bear on 
broad agriculture alone. They were herbalists and 
florists, both medicinal (for we need hardly say that in 
former times the monks and clergy were the only 
leeches) and ornamental. 

All creatures have their joj, and man hath his ; 
Yet if we rightly measure, 
Man's joy and pleasure 
Bather hereafter than in present is. 
Not that he may not here 
Taste of the cheer ; 
J3ut as birds drink, and straight lift up the head, 
So must he sip and think 
Of better drink 
He may attain to ailer he is dead.' 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. Q,6g 

The following pretty lines are as truthful as if 
they were written in homely prose : — 

When abbeys rose in towered state. 

And over wood and dell 
Went sonnding, with a royal voice, 

The stately minster bell — 

Then was the abbey-garden made 

All with the nicest care ; 
Its little borders quaintly cut 

In fancies rich and rare. 

And there they brought all curious plants. 

With sainted names ; a flower 
For every Saint's day of the year— 

For every holy hour; 
And there was set in pride of place 

The noble passion-flower. 

And there they kept, the joyous monks. 

Within a garden small. 
All plants that had a healing power. 

All herbs medicinal. 

And thither came the sick, the maimed. 

The moonstruck, and the blind, 
For holy flower, for wort of power, 

For charmed root and rind. 

From a very ingenious work I extract a portion of 
the imagined address of a poor monk to his flock, on 
his leaving them : — 

^ In the intercalary moments of my canonical hours 
of prayer, I have collected together the treasures of 



Q.'jo god's acrel 

Flora^ and gathered from her plants the useful arts ot 
physic by which you have been benefited. Ever 
mindful of the useful object of the labour to which 
I had condemned myself, I have brought together 
into the garden of this priory the lily of the valley 
and the gentian of the mountain, the nymphae of 
the lake and the cliver of the arid bank ; in short, I 
have collected the pilewort^ the throatwort, the liver- 
wort, and every other vegetable specific which the 
kind hand of Nature has spread over the globe, and 
which I have designated by their qualities, and have 
converted to your use and benefit. Mindful also of 
the pious festivals which our Church prescribes^ I 
have sought to make these charming objects of floral 
nature the time-pieces of my religious calendar, and 
the mementos of the hastening period of my mortality. 
Thus 1 can light the taper to our Virgin-mother on 
the blowing of the white snowdrop, which opens its 
floweret at the time of Candlemas ; the lady^s smock 
and the daffodil remind me of the Annunciation ; the 
blue harebell, of the festival of St. George ; the 
ranunculus, of the invention of the Cross ; the scarlet 
lychnis, of St. John the Baptist's day; the white 
lily, of the Visitation of our Lady ; and the virgin^s 
bower, of her Assumption ; and Michaelmas, Martin- 
mas, Holy Bood, and Christmas, have all their 
appropriate monitors. I learn the time 6f the 



FLOWEES ON GRAVES. %^l 

day from the shutting of the blossoms of the star of 
Jerusalem and the dandelion, and the hour of the 
night by the stars/ 

Is it any marvel that the Christian Church, the 
alone one to recognise fully HiM 

Whose sunshine and whose showers 
Tume.all the patient groond to flowers, 

should have habitually resorted to these mute but 
eloquent remembrancers at that solemn service 
when the dust returned to earth as it was, and the 
spirit returned to God who gave it ? 

Nor was the superstition unpleasing, however ill- 
founded, which taught that the surest way to prevent 
evil spirits from haunting the graves of those we 
loved, was to keep them freshly planted, or strewn 
with flowers, which by their purity are supposed to 
prevent the approach of any unearthly evil. 

As, under the Promise, the first plot of ground 
was a sepulchre, so under its fulfilment the first 
sepulchre was in a garden ; 'in a garden Christ was 
placed in the earth, that the malediction on Adam 
might be eradicated.' 

The Bay has been more especially appropriated to 
funeral solemnities, because it has been said that 
this tree, when apparantly dead to the very root, will 
revive, and its withered branches reassume their 



2^2 gob's acre. 

wonted verdure ; and its decay is said to be predicar 
tive of some accident The ancients belieyed it to be 
a protection from lightning, and it has often been 
planted in England as a security therefrom. It used 
to be supposed also that the aromatic emissions of 
these trees cleared the air and resisted contagion. 

The primitive Christians decorated young women 
with flowers when they were buried; a custom which 
always obtained in England ; where it has also been 
common until lately, and perhaps is still so in places, 
to hang a garland of white roses over the grave of a 
person dying young. These are the ' virgin crants,'^ 
the 'maiden strewments' alluded to by that most 

accurate portrayer of English manners, Shakspeare, 

• 

as being granted to Ophelia instead of the 'shards, 
flints, and pebbles' which (she having committed 
suicide) 'should be thrown on her;'' and so, when 

^ Grant — a garland* 

' According to the manner of the pagans, shards and pehbles 
were found in several ancient barrows, which being not the 
natural produce of the soil, must have been intentionall j placed 
there. The learned author of the Nenia Britanniea thinks it 
probable that this costom furnished Shakspeare with the line- 
Shards, flints, and pebbles should be thrown on her. 

And again the sexton asks — 

'Is she to be buried in Christian burial, that wilfully seeks her 
own salvation P' 



FLOWERS ON GRAVES. !XJ^ 

Fidele is supposed to be dead, Arviragus bursts out 
thus : — 

With fairest flowers. 
Whilst summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele, 
I'll sweeten thy sad grave : thou shalt not lack 
The flower, that's like thy face, pale primrose, nor 
The azur'd harebell like thy veins ; no, nor 
The leaf of eglantine. 

Some of Herrick's prettiest lines run thus : — 

Follow me weeping to my turfe, and there 
Let fall a primrose, and with it a teare ; 
Then lastly let some weekly strewings he 
Devoted to the memory of me ; 
Then shall my ghost not walk abont, bat keep 
Still in the coole and silent shades of sleep. 

Eosemary, so commonly used at weddings, is in 
greater request at funerals in Staffordshire, Cumber- 
land, and other parts of England, even to this day. 
In former times it was considered indispensable. So 

To which his fellow replies — 

* I tell thee, she is ; therefore make her grave straight ; the 
crowner hath set on her, and finds it Christian burial.' 

That is, make the grave east and west, parallel with the church, 
as they were always made, except in the case of suicides, and 
perhaps some other criminals. 

In the churchyard of Fomham All Saints, in Suflblk, is a 
coffin-shaped monument which stands north and south ; and tra- 
dition says that its occupant, who died in 1707, ordered that 
position of her grave as a mark of penitence and humiliation. 



274 ^0^ » ^^^^ 

Friar Lawrence, when the Capulets are weeping over 

Juliet, directs thus : — 

Stick your rosemaiy 
On tKis fair corse ; and as the custom is. 
In all her best array, bear her to church. 

And Gay writes :— 

Upon her grave the rosemary they threw. 
The daisy, butter'd-flower, and endive blue. 

Also:— 

To show their love, the neighbours far and near 
FoUow'd with wistful look the damsel's bier : 
Sprigg'd rosemary the lads and lasses bore, 
While dismally the parson walk*d before. 

Herrick's couplet shows its constant adaptation to 
marriage and death :— 

Grow for two ends, it matters not at all, 
Be't for my bridal or my burial. 

A French writer describing an English funeral in 
the time of William III. says, that every one takes 
a sprig of rosemary to put in the grave ; and an 
engraving of a funeral in Hogarth, represents each 
mourner as carrying a sprig. 

From personal knowledge the writer can speak to 
the continuance of this custom in Lancashire and 
Cumberland twenty years ago. 

Doubtless from its greenness and fragrance having 



FLOWERS OK GRAVES. 275 

^ seeming and davour all the winter long/ it was a 
token of remembrance. So poor Ophelia to her 
brother — ' There's rosemary, that's for remembrance ; 
pray you, love, remember.* 

Aubrey, in his MiacdldnieSy records the custom at 
Oakley, in Surrey, of planting rose-trees on the 
graves of lovers, by the survivors ; and in Wales, to 
this day, not only are roses planted round graves, but 
it is usual to keep the graves freshly strewn over, for 
twelve months, with green herbs and flowers,^ 

There is a grave in Wimbledon churchyard, of 
recent erection, which is quite a cultivated little 
garden. A few words engraven on the reverse of 
the headstone, pray the passer-by not to pluck the 
flowers. 

One of the prettiest memorials of the kind which 
I have seen, one before which, frail and fading as it 
was, 'storied urn and animated bust* seemed poor, 
was in the Newton Chapel of Bristol Cathedral. A 
diamond-shaped slab of white marble in the pave- 
ment, recorded the death of a child of about five 
years — ^the only child, as we afterwards learnt, of 

^ In Norway, at fanerals, the road to the charchyard and 
to the grave is strewed with the green tops of fir or juniper. 
The gathering and selling these green juniper huds, for this 
and for domestic purposes, is a sort of trade for the poor and 
aged. 

T % 



2j6 god's acbe. 

his parents. Environing and partly covering this 
tablet, arranged in an oval form, was a long wreath 
or garland of the richest and most beautiful flowers 
of the conservatory ; beautiful hyacinths, scarlet and 
pink and white camellias, rich azaleas, the deli- 
cate narcissus, the flowering heath, the early lily, 
and the never-failing monthly rose, intermingled with 
various evergreens — all emblems and tokens of a 
resurrection from the grave — a new life hereafter. 
And the season, too, for it was Easter, pointed the 
moral which those beautiful emblems gave. 

There must be a holy and a lofty hope beaming even 
through the grief and sorrow of those who, year after 
year, at the same apposite period. Palm Sunday, the 
opening of the holiest week, as it is the appointed 
path to the most glorious festival the Christian 
knows, renew this memorial of affection to their lost 
son. 



CHAPTER XL 

SANCTUABY. 

/^NE privilege formerly appropriated to the en- 
^ virons of a church, or the sacred proximity of the 
Cross in a Cemetery, was the usage of Sanctuary ; in 
the present state of society needless, and now and for 
ever rightly done away. We read of ' cities of refuge' 
under the Mosaical dispensation, when Moses severed 
cities toward the sun-rising, ' that the slayer might flee 
thither which should kill his neighbour unawares, 
and hated him not in times past' 

In Israel was many a refuge city 
To which the blameless homicide might flee, 

And daim protection, sustenance, and pity, 
Safe from the blood-avenger's enmity. 

Until the law's acquittal sent him thence. 

Free from offence. 

The characteristics and customs of the Eastern 
nations made this usage peculiarly applicable to, 
indeed necessary for them. To this hour it is a 
point of honour amongst them for the nearest rela- 
tive of a person violently killed to become 'the 



ajS god's acre. 

avenger of his blood ;' and the homicide, how unin- 
tentional or unpremeditated soever the offence, is 
pursued relentlessly by the kinsman of the slain. 

Moses legislated on existing usages and abuses 
so as to offer not only a mere temporary shelter 
to the unintentional manslayer, but he took pains 
to make the refuge available and sure. That no- 
thing might impede the flight of the fugitive, the 
roads to these cities of refuge were kept broad 
and level; drains and bridges were maintained in 
good repair; and guide posts were placed at every 
turning.! 

Earnestly and reverentially anxious as were the 
first fathers of Christianity to inxjorpoiate in her ser- 
vices every humane tenet of ' The Law,' we are not 
surprised to find that the custom and privilege of 
Sanctuary were early engrafted into the customs of 
our Church. And it was a not less touching than 
practical illustration of the beneficence of our holy 
religion the thus making the Church a refuge, a 
pitying patient mother, even for those who had 



^ In most countries this custom of Asylum has more or less 
gained: the pagan temples were crowded with criminals pro- 
tected by the people, who regarded the right of asylum as a 
popular privilege. In the time of Augustus and Tiberius the 
temples of Greece and Bome were full of criminab uncontrollable 
by the law. 



aA^NCTUABT. 279 

openly transgressed her pious laws, her holy teach- 
ing. 

Bound old cathedral, abbey church, and palace, 

Did we ourselves a Sanctuary draw. 
Where no stem creditor could glut his malice, 

And even criminals might brave the law ; 
For judge nor justice in that chartered verge 
His rights could urge. 

This privilege of Sanctuary our Church gradually 
obtained by traditional usage. For as we read in 
Neander's Church History : — 'As the pagan temples 
had already been considered asylums for such as fled 
to them for refuge, and as the images of the Emperor 
served the same purpose, so now this use passed over 
to the Christian churches. It is evident how salu- 
tary a thing this might prove under the circumstances 
of those times ; since taking refuge in the asylum of 
the church, particularly at the altar, afibrded time 
for the bishops to intercede for the unfortunate before 
any injury could be done them. They who were 
persecuted by a victorious party, in times of civil 
disturbance, could, in the first instance, here find pro- 
tection against the sword ; and the bishops, meanwhile, 
gain time to apply to the powerful for their pardon. 
Many examples of this kind are furnished in the 
labours of Ambrose, during the Western revolutions 
of his period. Slaves could here find protection, for 
the first moment, against the c^uel rage of their 



i^So gob's acbk 

masters, and subsequently, by the interposition of 
the bishops, appease their anger. Such as were by 
misfortune involved in debt and persecuted by their 
creditors, could here gain shelter for the first moment ; 
and pious bishops could in the meantime find means, 
either by a collection in their communities, or by an 
advance of money from the Church funds, of cancellmg 
their debt, or of effecting a compromise between 
them and their creditors. It is true this right of the 
Churches, which, under the circumstances of those 
times, could be applied to such salutary purposes, 
might also be abused by the hierarchical arrogance of 
some bishops. This right was at first not conceded 
to the Churches by a law, but had its ground 
simply in the universal belief; and hence it hap- 
pened too that it was often violated by rude tyran- 
nical men/ 

Dreadfully as these Asyla degenerated from their 
original purpose, until, in the words of the Duke of 
Buckingham,^ they became * a rabble of theeves, 
murtherers, pud malitious heynous traytors,* their 
general advantage can hardly be over-estimated dur- 
ing those ages when society was disorganized, laws 



^ The friend of the treacherous Bichard Duke of Gloucester, 
in whose behalf he assisted to beguile the unfortunate young 
princes from Sanctuary. 



SAKCTUABT. 28 1 

UDsettledy and power and strength rampani Then 
they interposed a check to the immediately fearful 
consequences of a rash act : they gave time for the 
awakening conscience of a wilful offender to prompt 
him to humiliation before God, atonement to man ; 
and they provided against that sudden revenge which 
would probably have involved in tenfold crime and 
misery both the aggressor and the injured party. 

That reverend and often quoted father of the 
Church, Saint Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, 
who lived in the fourth century, was noted for his 
firm and energetic defence of those who sought re- 
fuge at the Altar. He had defended so many unfor- 
tunate individuals from the violence of the unprin- 
cipled but powerful Eutropius, that the latter, in the 
year A.D. 398, procured the enactment of a law to 
restrict the privilege of Sanctuary. It seems a justice 
more poetical than usually actual that forced Eutro- 
pius himself, flying from the fury of the Goths, to 
seek refuge in the very Sanctuary which had been, 
and was then, especially upheld by Chrysostom. 

Grown thus out of common usage and custom, the 
right of Sanctuary, not yet specifically or legally ac- 
knowledged, had become a great and beneficent power 
in the hands of the early Church, and but too necessary 
to the people when might was right, and the enact- 
ment of just laws by no means ensured their due 



aSz god's acre. 

observance. The first law passed expressly sano- 
tioning the asylum of the Church was in the year of 
grace 431, when it was ordamed that not only the 
Altar (on which you will remember the symbol of 
redemption was then always conspicuously displayed), 
but whatever formed any part of the Church buildings, 
should be an inviolable place of refuge, and that no 
xmhappy person who fled there unarmed, should be 
removed by force. Those who had resorted thither 
with weapons, and refused to give them up to the 
clergy, might be taken by force. 

This privHege was at length extended veiy widely ; 
and so holy was the symbol of the Cross esteemed in 
what we call the dark ages, that he must have been 
one of the boldest even of the bold and ruthless men 
of those days, who would forcibly eject even a noto- 
rious culprit who had gained the shelter of a common 
way-side Cross. 

In no country has the right of Sanctuary been so 
freely bestowed and so fully privileged as in England. 
Some churches were deemed more sacred than others, 
and, as in other circumstances of life, as in burial, for 
instance, the dififerent parts of the church were held 
in various degrees of estimation, and the forfeitures 
for violation were proportionate. At Hexham four 
Crosses were erected, about a mile from the church 




SAKCTUABT. a 83 

each way, defining the limits of the Sanctuary. Not 
even a malefactor could be seized on the very verge 
of these limits without the imposition of a fine on his 
captor for violation of Sanctuary. If in the church- 
yard, the fine was higher; if in the Church, higher 
still ; if in the choir, to the fine was added penance 
for sacrilege; and if the pursuer passed on so far as 
the Altar, or the Holy relics, the offence was not re- 
deemable. 

Nevertheless, breaches of Sanctuary did occur, 
though it was even supposed at one time that the 
Divine vengeance against this offence had been in 
some cases specially displayed ; as in the instance of 
Thurstin, a knight, of whom Leland reports that he 
was stricken with disease at the very instant of pur- 
suing a person into church with a drawn sword. 

Our King Henry II. is said to have shown no 
reverence whatever for Sanctuary, but to have 
taken delinquents, both lay and clerical, from churches 
without scruple. The death of Becket at the Altar 
is notorious. 

When Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent and High 
Justiciary in the time of Edward III., having 
fallen under that monarches displeasure, took Sanc- 
tuary, the king violated it. But so strongly was he 
arraigned by the Bishop of London and other pre- 
lates, that he^ king though he was, felt compelled to: 



a84 QOjy's acre 

restore the fugitive to his shelter. Foiled in this, 
Edward endeavoured to starve De Burgh into sur- 
render (a common resource of ruthless prosecutors in 
those days), by commanding the sheriff to prevent any 
person from supplying him with victuals. He was 
rescued, however, by an armed force. 

In 1378, Kobert Hanley, who had taken Sanctuary 
at Westminster, was slain there, even during the 
performance of divine service. The church was shut 
up for four months on account of this profanation ; 
a large fine was paid, and the offenders were excom- 
municated. 

These were brutal and very rare infringements of 
the reverence usually accorded to Sanctuary. Even 
the ruthless Duke of Gloucester persuaded Queen 
Elizabeth Woodville to trust the ill-fated princes to 
his care, with whom she had hurriedly escaped from 
the palace to the privileged Abbey ; and the astute 
Henry VII. beguiled Perkin Warbeck from Beau- 
lieu, though doubtless he had power to compel his 
surrender. But, in the reign of this very monarch, 
the Sheriffs having forcibly taken a man from Sanc- 
tuary, the Abbot of Westminster exhibited a bill to 
the King against them, and the matter being heard in 
the Star Chamber, the sheriffs were grievously fined 

How amply and beneficently all the charities of 
Sanctuary were fulfilled in the spirit as well as the 



SANCTUART. 285 

letter of their first beneficent intention, we learn from 
the Ancient Rites and Monumenta of the Church of 
Durham, There, a wide circuit round the Abbey 
church was Sanctuary for any offender who fled to 
the church-door and knocked. 

* There were certain men that did lie always in 
two chambers over the said north door, for the pur- 
pose, that when such offenders did come and knock, 
straitway they were let in at any hour, and then they 
did run strait away to the Galilee Bell and did tole 
it, to the intent that any man that heard it might 
know that some man had taken sanctuary ; and when 
the prior had intelligence thereof, he sent word and 
commanded them to have a gown of black cloth, 
made with a cross of yellow, called St. Cuthbert's 
Cross, set on the shoulder of the left arm, to the 
intent that every one might see that there was 
such a privilege granted by God unto St. Cuthbert's 
shrine for all such offenders to fly unto for succour 
until such time as they might obtain their prince's 
pardon ; and likewise they had meat and drink, 
bedding, and other necessaries for thirty-seven days, 
at the expense of the house, till such time as the 
prior could get them conveyed out of the diocese/ 

But we shall mistake if we suppose that these 
benefits were granted freely and continuously, with- 
out reference to the past crime of the offender, or 



286 qod's acrb. 

Bupervision of his moral conduct during his abode 
in Sanctuary. To some of the worst crimes it was 
distinctly forbidden. As it was considered as having 
regard to penance and atonement, refugees were 
required to confess, and to take an oath to observe 
strictly the rules and regulations laid down. For as 
under the Saxon laws every offence except malicious 
homicide (and in some cases that) was redeemable 
for money, these Sanctuaries, in their original in- 
tention, afforded only temporary refuge until these 
negotiations could be completed. 

Ina, king of the West Saxons, decreed, in the year 
693, that any one taking refuge in a church should 
have his life spared, even though guilty of a capital 
crime ; but he was to make such atonement^ short of 
that, as the law might decree. 

Alfred the Great, and succeeding monarchcf, con- 
firmed the privilege of Sanctuary with limitations as 
to time. 

The person who had taken Sanctuary was compelled 
to abjure the realm within forty days. He was 
required to make full confession of his crime, to clothe 
himself in sackcloth, and taking a cross in his hand, 
to embark at the nearest port If apprehended on 
his way thither within forty days, he had a right to 
plead his privilege of Sanctuary. 

If he neglected to make his escape before the 



SANCTTJART* 287 

• 

expiration of forty days, it became felony for any 
one to afford him even sustenance. 

But in time it was found that the hands of our 
foreign enemies were considerably strengthened by 
these outlaws, who were oftentimes stalwart, bold, 
and valorous men, good sailors and good archers ; and 
then they were forbidden to quit the country ; and 
in Henry VIII/s time a law was made ordaining 
permanent Sanctuary, Then, indeed, the herding 
together of these turbulent spirits produced the 
worst results. 

In a note is given the form of confession to be 
made by a criminal on seeking Sanctuary ;^ also, a 
copy of the oath taken in the reigns of Edward IV., 
Henry VII., and Henry VIII., by those who ^ sought 

' ' This hear thon, Sir Coroner, that I, M. of S., am a stealer 
of sheep or of any other heast, or a murderer of one or more, and 
because I have done many such evils and robberies in this land, 
I do abjure the land of our Lord Edward King of England, and 
I shall haste me towards the port of such a place which thou hast 
given me ; and that I shall not go out of the highway, and if I 
do, I will that I be taken as a robber and a felon of our Lord the 
King ; and that at such place, I will diligently seek fi)r passage, 
and that I will tarry there but one flood and ebb, if I can have 
passage ; and unless I can have it in such a place, I will go many 
a day into the sea up to my knees, assaying to pass over ; and 
unless I can do this within forty days I will put myself again 
into the church as a robber and a felon of our Lord the King, so 
God me help and his holy judgment.' — Bastbll's Collections, 



288 qod's acbk 

the peace of the place' at Beverley Church m 
Yorkshire, a sanctuary endowed with especial privi- 
leges^ by King Athelstan in the year 937, in honour 

^ The bailiff of the town by whom the oath was administered 
is directed to inquire of the refugee, ' what man he killed, and 
wherwith, and both ther names ; and then gar hym lay his hand 
yppon the book, sayng on this wyse, 

* ' Sir, tak hede on your oth. Ye shal be trew and feythful 
to my Lord Archbishop of York, lord off this towne, to the proyest 
of thessame, to the chanons of this Ghirch, and all other minstr's 
thereof. 

* * Also ye shall here gude hert to the baillie and xii govemars 
of this town, to all burges' and comyners of thessame. 

* * Also ye shall here no poynted wapon, dagger, knyfe, ne none 
other wapen ayenst the kyng's pece. 

* * Also ye shal be redy at all your power if ther be any debate 
or stryf, or oot so than case of fyre within the town to help to 
s'cess it. 

' ' Also ye shal be redy at the obite of Kyng Adelstan, at the 
Dirige, and the Messe at such tyme as it is done at the wamyng 
of the belman of the town, and do your dewte in ryngyng, and 
for to offer the Messe on the morre, so help you Grod and thies 
holy Evangelists.' 

* And then gar hym kysse the book.' 

The bailiff's fee on this occasion appears to have been 2S, ^d, ; 
that of the clerk of the court, for inscribing the name of the 
party seeking refuge in the Sanctuary register, ^d. 

The description of the party, whether as a gentleman, or a 
tradesman, or a yeoman, is regularly entered, with the place of 
residence, and the place and mode in which the ciime protected 
was committed by the person seeking refuge. — Published in the 
ArchBohgiafirom a Marleian MS* 



. SANCTUABY. ^8g 

of the eminent saint, St John of Beverley, who had 
been buried in the porch of Beverley Minster two 
hundred years before. 

The two most celebrated Sanctuaries in the me- 
tropolis were, to quote again the Duke of Bucking- 
ham, ' tone at the elbowe of the city, the tother in 
the very bowels ;' that is to say, Westminster and 
Saint Martin-le-Grand. 

The latter church, and most noted Sanctuary, 
stood precisely on the spot now occupied by the 
General Post-Office. It was a place of immense 
resort, and early not-ed for turbulence and misrula 
Henry VI., in the thirty-fifth year of his reign, * after 
great deliberation and communication had,' enacted a 
code of regulations for its government, of which the 
following is a very brief abstract : — 

That every fugitive, ' as soone as hee commodiously 
and reasonably may, shall present himself unto the 
Dean, his Commissary or Depute, and before him 
.declare the fear moving him to come to the said 
Sanctuary ; be it for treason, felony surmised upon 
him, or for other causes.' 

. And this declaration to be registered, with the 
name of the fugitive. 

That he deliver up *all manner of weapon and 
armour that he bringeth with him, as well invasive a^ 

U 



290 GOD S ACRE. 

defensive'—' except a reasonable knife to kerve withaU 
his meete, and that the said knife be pointlesse/ 

That every ' erraunt and open theefe, robber, mur- 
derer, and felon' known as such, that he may not under 
colour of Sanctuary do further mischief, shall find 
suflScient security in himself and others * of his good 
bearing for the time of his abode within the said 
Sanctuary, and for a quarter of a year after his 
departing out of the same/ 

To be kept in ward until such security is found. 

That all the outgates, posterns, doors, and all 
other issues be closed from nine at night until six 
in the morning from AUhallows Feast to Candlemas, 
and the remainder of the year from nine till four, or 
until the time of the first mas& 

Any stolen goods brought there to be restored, 
and no fugitive to receive, conceal, or buy any such. 

No woman of evil life was to be supported there, 
but if she claimed Sanctuary, as this might not be 
refused, she was to be placed in an open ward where 
all might see her, so that shame should compel her 
to quit. 

Hazard and dice were not allowed, and all artificers 
were bound to keep holy Sundays and festival days. 

Though every one was sworn on entering to con- 
form to these rules, it would appear from Stow that 
they had not much practical influenca 



SANCTUARY. ^91 

Saint Martin's appears to have been a Sane- 
tuaiy for great delinquents^ and a shelter for the 
loosest sort of people; rogues^ ruffians, thieves, 
felons, and murderers. ^ From hence used to rush 
violent persons, committers of riots, robberies, and 
manslaughters ; hither they brought in their preys 
and stolen goods, and concealed them here, and 
shared or sold them to those that dwelt here. Here 
were also harboured picklocks, counterfeiters of keys 
and seals, forgers of false evidences, such as made 
counterfeit chains, beads, ouches, plate, coppergilt for 

gold ; nay, common and ; gamesters and 

players at hazard and dice, and other unlawful games. 
And, lastly, profaners of Sundays and other festival 
days, exercising their crafts thereon.' 

And according to historians the state of the Sanc- 
tuary at Westminster was quite as bad. The immu- 
nities and privileges of the Church in regard to 
Sanctuary seem never to have run higher than in the 
thirteenth century, and it was probably at this time 
that debtors got admission into these places ot 
immunity, ' and bid their creditours go whistle them/ 
An utter annihilation of the original beneficent and 
Christian purpose of Sanctuary. Westminster is said 
to have swarmed with thieves and unprincipled 
debtors. 

This Sanctuary, composed of two churches, one 

V 2 



29 2 ood's acbe. 

over the other, each in the form of a cross, occupied 
the site of the present town-hall, national-school, 
&c., close to Westminster Hospital It was built of 
rag-stone of Sussex, and with mortar so tempered 
that no rock could be harder. Attempts were made 
to blow up part of it with gunpowder, for it was a 
work of great labour and expense to demolish it 
This was eflFected, however, in the year 1750, when it 
was proposed to build a new market-house on the site. 

In the reign of Henry VIII. all persons guilty of 
treason were refused any benefit or privilege of 
Sanctuary. It was forbidden also to those guilty of 
murder, burglary, highway robbery, or incendiarism. 

Edward VL drew these restrictions still closer; 
and though Queen Mary temporarily restored the 
"Sanctuary at Westminster to its wonted liberties, still 
the universal law of progress nullified its use. Law 
and civilization having taken the place of anarchy and 
barbarism, this institution of Sanctuary (as had been 
the case with other usages righteous and requisite in 
their original enactment) fell into desuetude, being 
unneeded when law and justice were maintained 
throughout the land, and deleterious in proportion to 
its inutility. 

And by statute in the first year of James I. the old 
usage of Sanctuary was totally abolished. 



A 



CHAPTER XII. 

MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 
The Grod who made us gave us tears. 

TTARDLY more diversified are the nations who 
**--■- people the earth, than are the customs and 
observances used by them to signalize the arrival of 
the commonest of all visitors, though most awful of 
all guests, the 'black-veiled king of the dead' 
The Jews of old rent their garments and sprinkled 
dust on their heads, a practice followed to this day in 
Abyssinia, and observed by a late traveller on the 
occasion of the death of the esteemed English Consul, 
Mr. Salt, in Egypt The practice of tearing the gar- 
ments is, we are told, commuted by the Jews of these 
economical days into carefully cutting away a small, 
and very probably a perfectiy insignificant, portion 
thereof. They bottled their tears also, a custom 
referred to in the 56th Psalm ; and that this practice 
was customary with the Greeks and Romans, the 
number of lachrymatories or tear-botties found among 
their Bepulchral remains sufficiently testifies. 

In a * curiosity shop' at Brighton are many daintily- 
coloured and variously-shaped minute phials, labelled 



294 GODS ACBE. 

* Chinese Tear Bottles.' I have seen such frequently 
in London, but, being not labelled, I did not recognise 
their use. To say nothing of the fact that many of 
them are calculated for a very moderate degree of 
grief, it puzzled me to guess how even a single tear 
could be guided to the minute orifice of the smaller 
ones. I once heard a lady say that her yoxmgest 
daughter felt so keenly the loss of her sister (then 
just happily married), that she had cried ' scores of 
quarts of tears.' Assuredly no approach to such 
effluence of weeping is provided for in the Chinese 
laxjhrymatories. 

This idea has been carried out to the extreme of 
absurdity in more modem times. A certain Count 
Schimmelmann, feeling I suppose that a mere phial 
of tears laid in her tomb would be but a poor token 
of his esteem for his wife and his despair for her loss, 
plax^ed her monumental effigy on a spring, which wa^ 
so arranged by interior mechanism, that the water 
dropped or spouted constantly from the eye — a token 
of his enduring grief It is near Copenhagen, and 
is known by the name of * The Weeping Eya' One 
would think, at a first glance, that the force of folly 
could no further go, but perhaps we should judge 
hastily. "We read of M. de Brunei, who put his park 
in mourning on the death of his mother, and had 
barrels of ink sent from Paris that the jets d'eau 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 295 

might be in mourning also. I remember once hear- 
ing a very little girl rather gravely reasoned with on 
the folly of having put her doll in mourning for the 
cat. I question whether she were more childish than 
the gentleman who has so peculiarly immortalized his 
name. 

Whatever may have been the caprices of individuals 
in mourning for another, they are at least equalled, 
in frequent instances, by those of the dying themselves. 
We read of a chaise-driver who desired to be buried 
as near the high road as possible, for the satisfaction, 
U is said, of hearing carriages pass ; of a fox-hunter 
who would be buried with a fox-pad in each hand ; 
and of a notorious smoker, who, dying at the age of 
one hundred and six years, desired that his pipe might 
be laid in his co£Sn. 

Mrs. Gaskell, in her Life of Charlotte Bronte, 
speaks of a squire who lived near Haworth, whose 
great amusement and occupation had been cock- 
fighting. During his last illness he had cocks brought 
to his chamber to see them fight as he lay in bed. 
When he became unable to turn to watch the battle, 
he had looking-glasses so arranged above and around 
him that he could still see all. And so he died. 

Scarcely less childish seems the decree of the 
English gentleman, Humphrey Morris, Esq., who 
died at Naples in 1785, and who was buried not only 



2g6 god's acrk 

at a great depths but in a coffin of cast-iron, fastened 
with two locks, the keys of which were kept by his 
executors in England* Those who had nerve to 
despoil the coffin would not be deterred by the 
difficulty of a lock or two. 

Ludovick Cortusius, an eminent lawyer, died at 
Padua on the T5th of July, 151 8. On his death-bed 
he forbade his relatives to shed tears at his funeral ; 
ordered musicians, singers, pipers, and fiddlers of aU 
kinds to supply the place of mourners ; and appointed 
twelve maids in green habits to be corpse-bearers, 
bequeathing them a handsome present. He laid a 
heavy penalty on his heir should he disobey these 
orders. 

And in 1733 died Mr. John Underwood, of 
Whittlesea, in Cambridgeshire. Six gentlemen who 
followed him to the grave sang the last stanza of the 
aoth Ode of the second book of Horace. No bell 
tolled, and no relation followed his corpse. His coffin 
was painted green. Horace was placed under his 
head, Milton under his feet, a Greek Testament in his 
right hand, a small Horace in his left The six 
gentlemen took supper at his house, and on the 
removal of the cloth sang the 31st Ode of the first 
book of Horace. Mr. Underwood left 6ooof. to his 
sister, on the condition of her implicitly following 
these, his directions. 



MOURNING CUSTOMS. ^97 

A late writer has pointed out the analogy between 
a mourning custom of the Australian savages of to- 
day, and of the ancient Hebrews, against which the 
latter were warned : a very singular practice, viz., 
the cutting or scratching the face with the nails, 
tearing the flesh between the eyes, and otherwise 
maiming the person, as is the custom of the female 
aborigines of Australia on the death of a relative. 

Thus were the people of God addressed :— • 

* Ye are the children of the Lord your God : ye shall 
not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between 
your eyes for the dead.' — (Deut xiv. i.) 

' Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for 
the dead, nor print any marks upon you.' — (LeVi, 
xix. 28.) 

And the prophet Jeremiah thus declares their 
coming ruin : — 

' Both great and small shall die in this land ; they 
shall not be buried, neither shall men lament for them, 
nor cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for 
them : 

* Neither shall men tear themselves for them in 
mourning to comfort them for the dead ; neither shall 
men give them the cup of consolation, to drink for 
their father or for their mother.'— (/er. xvi. 6, 7.) 

We are told that men sometimes wound themselves 
in excess of grief with lancets or other instruments, 



1^98 qod's acre. 

but that women are content to lacerate themselves with 
their nails. And in Abyssiniia^ we learn from Bruce, 
this operation is performed in a very scientific man- 
ner — a nice surgical operation. When a brother, a 
parent, a cousin-german, or lover dies, every woman 
in that relation, with the nail of her little finger, 
which she leaves long on purpose, cuts the skin of 
both her temples, about the size of a sixpence ; so 
that you see either a wound or a scar on every 
fair face in Abyssinia. The modem islanders of the 
South Seas wounded themselves with a sharp shell 
or a shark's tooth. 

The * cup of consolation' above referred to, and the 
^ bread of mourning,' sometimes called also the ' bread 
of bitterness,' were the refreshments always among 
the Jews supplied by friends to the bereaved person 
on his return firom the funeral — in its origin a most 
kind and hospitable relief to the bereaved family. 

They, the Jews, cherished their grief in every way ; 
they invited it ; they pampered it ; they took all 
pains to recal the poignancy of their affliction. They 
eat their food seated on the ground, and without 
shoes : — ^ The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon 
the ground and keep silence ; they have cast up dust 
upon theii' heads ; they have girded themselves with 
sackcloth : the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their 
heads to the ground.' — {Lam, ii lo.) For three days 




-^^ 



MOUBNING CtrSTOMS. 2gg 

they strove not to repress their tears :— * They weep 
perpetually the first three days.' For seyen days 
people came morning and evening to weep with 
them. At the end of seven days the mourner might 
attend the synagogue, but thirty must elapse ere he 
was allowed to bathe, or to dress his beard. 

With us custom seems to be the only acknow- 
ledged law as to the period of mourning, and modem 
custom abridges, we may say halves, the time that 
wss usual fifty years ago ; but in many countries the 
term was and is ascertained by law. The Jews, as 
we have seen, mourned thirty days ; the Lacedsemo- 
nians but eleven ; the Egyptians from forty to seventy 
days. Romulus fixed a widow's mourning at ten 
months, the length of his year. The Imperial Code 
not only ordained a year's mourning, but declared 
the widow infamous if she married within that period. 
The time of mourning is fixed by law in China, three 
years being the period required for a parent. It seems 
a part of the usual etiquette too that the eldest son, 
as chief mourner, should make continual attempts to 
rend his face and hair. 

The Jewish fashion^ of throwing a^hes on the head, 



^ And also the Egyptian cnstom. In the paintings in the 
tombs of fhnereal rites we always see monmers throwing dust on 
their heads, beating themselves, and evidently nttering cries. 



30O god's acrk 

beating the breast, and tearing the flesh with the 
nails, was, on occasions of peculiar concernment, 
adopted by the Greek& But in addition to the 
funeral feasts, which amongst Greeks and Bomans 
soon ceased to wear an entirely lugubrious aspect, 
they enlivened their melancholy with games and fu« 
neral processions Thede entertainments amongst 
the Greeks consisted chiefly of horse-races, where 
garlands of parsley were awarded to the victors. 
The Boman games were processions, and the very 
characteristic entertainment of the mortal strife of 
gladiators around the funeral pile. These funeral 
games were abolished by the Emperor Claudius. 

We have referred i» an earlier page, veiy briefly, 
to the custom of cutting off the hair, and casting it on 
the body or into the tomb. So did the Boman 
women on Virginia ; so did the Ephesian matron on 
her husband — ^all unluckily for her second nuptials ; 
so did Orestes on his father's tomb, Hecuba on her 
sons' ; and so did the pure, and gentle, and pious Anti- 
gone on her brother's 

The shaving of the head, or at least the cutting oft 
the hair, seems in all ages to have been considered 
an emblem of mourning and a token of violent afflic- 
tioiL The Jews made their heads bald and clipped 
their beards. Job, in his sorrow, shaved his head. 




MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 30I 

When the prophet Ezekiel speaks of the Israelites 
' mourning' under the calamities which he predicts, 
he says — * They shall gird themselves with sackcloth, 
and horror shall cover them; and shame shall be 
upon all faces, and baZdneaa upon aK their heads' — • 
(Ezek vii. 18.) 

Agfi^in, the prophet Jeremiah says (vii. 29) — * Cut 
ofiP thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and 
take up 9. lamentation on high places ;' and Micah 
exhorting Israel to mourn for the wrath of God — 
^Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy delicate 
children' (L 16). Ezekiel, prophesying the destruc- 
tion of Tyre, says of her mariners, &c. — * They shall 
make themselves utterly bald for thee' (xxviL 31). 

The classical nations cut off their hair ; indeed, it 
was their opinion that a lock of hair from the head of 
the dying person xnust be offered to Proserpine 
before the soul of the sufferer could be released. 
Hence perhaps the custom of mourners to shave 
their hair, as in Alceatia^ — 

Nor vase of fountain-water do I see 
Before the doors, as cnstom claims, to bathe 
The corse ; and none hath on the portal placed^ 
His locks, in solemn mourning for the dead 
Usually shorn. 

They were afterwards cast on the funeral pile. 



1 EuBiFiDBSt PoTTEs's. Translation. 



<"■ ■. ■ - . ■ 1. * !■ ^i^-.«M 



302 god's acbe. 

I 

And again in the same tragedy- 

Some means of safety 
Hast thou assigned P or must these looks be shorn, 
And sorrow robe me in her sable weeds P 

And again— 

I give command that all in solemn grief 

For this dear woman shear their locks, and wear 

The sable garb of mourning. 

Again, the opportune visitor, Hercules, who rescues 
her, inquires — 

Why are thy locks in sign of mourning shorn P 

In the Odyssey, book xxiv. — 

Tears flow'd from every eye, and o'er the dead 
Each clipp'd the curling honours of hb head. 

And Sappho's second Epigram — 

Her loved companions pay the rites of wo— 
All, all, alas ! the living can bestow ; 
From their fair heads the graceful curls they shear. 
Place on her tomb, and drop the tender tear. 

The Persian soldiers cut ofif their hair on the death 
of Alexander. This custom continued indeed to be 
the expression of general mourning. The Empress 
Irene cut ofif her hair when the Emperor Alexius 
died ; and we are told that the modem Greek women 
retain the usage. 




MOURNING CTOTOMS. 303 

Even so late as the middle of the sixteenth cen- 
tury, a writer, describing the cemetery of a Servian 
town, says — ^ Large bunches of hair also hung from 
many of the tombs, which had been deposited there 
by the women as a sign of mourning/ 

From such originals has been derived the custom, 
prevalent still on the stage, and in some places in 
real life, of tearing the hair in lamentation over the 
dead. Almost to this day the usage has obtained in 
England for one in the deepest circumstances of 
mourning, not indeed to out off her hair, but en- 
tirely to hide and conceal it Originally, probably, 
it was really cut off. 

But this custom of cutting off the hair was not 
restricted to human beings. The manes of horses 
were cut off at a great man's funeral It was pro- 
bably, originally, a Persian custom. It is alluded to 
in the tragedy from which I have so frequently 

quoted : — 

Through my realms of Thessaly 

I give command that all in golemn grief 

For this dear woman shear their looks, and wear 

The sable garb of mooming; from your steeds, 

Whether in pairs they whirl the oar, or bear 

Single the rider's rein, their waving manes 

Cut dose. 

This was done at the funerals of Hephsdstion, of 
Mardonius, and Pelopidas. 



304 god's acre. 

This usage subsided into covering horses with 
mourning-trappings and symbols^ and so leading 
.them in procession at funerals^ which was the case 
in the time of St Chrysostom^ in the fourth cen- 
tury, 

• 

I once heard a young lady play an Irish Keen on 
the piano. Not being at all an accomplished per- 
former^ she was anxious to avoid the display; but 
the lady of the house saying, * Surely, surely you can 
play us a Keen,' she at once complied Without 
.specific point or character, a soft undulating move- 
ment, wailing and plaintive, it quite upset all my 
previous notions of the Keen. It had nothing of the 
sbriU cry of the Banshee, nor of the wild howl of un- 
checked and unregulated passion. I could fancy it a 
fitting accompaniment to the heartbroken lament of 
some ancient nurse or retainer over the corpse of a 
lost and cherished chief, when the intensity of her 
grief forth breaks with a simple pathos which amounts 
almost to improvisation, and her broken lamentations 
are uttpred in mournfully accordant soundsL Such, 
it is said, even to this day is the lament of the Greek 
mother over her lost infant ; for a less tender relation 
than that of mother and babe, the services of hired 
. mourners are resorted to. 

I made various, but I am sony to say unsuccessful, 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 305 

attempts to obtain the notes of the Irish lament I 
have referred to. 

It seems to have been ever usual to utter noisy 
demonstrations of sorrow for deceased friends, and 
also to hire assistance that the noise might be great 
enough. Such assistants were the Prseficee, the old 
women hired by the Bomans to shed tears and sing 
the praises of deceased persons, and who usually 
followed next after the trumpeter or other musicians 
in the funeral procession. 

The Jews used to hire minstrels and others to 
mourn and lament for the dead. 

' After they had mourned for Jacob seventy days, 
Joseph and his brethren went up to Canaan to bury 

him : 

' And they came to the threshing floor of Atad, 
which is beyond Jordan, and there they mourned with 
a great and sore lamentation/ — (Oen. 1. Ji, 13.) 

* They (the priests) roar and cry before their gods, 
as men do at the feast when one is dead.' — (Baruch 

vi. 32.) 

'And when Jesus came into the ruler's house, 

and saw the minstrela cmd the people TnaJcmg a 

noise, 

' He said unto them. Give place : for the maid is 
not dead, but sleepeth.' — (Matt. ix. 23, 24.) 

The poorest man in Israel, when his wife died, 

X 



3o6 god's acre. 

never had less than two pipes and one mourning 
woman. Thus, continues the writer, mourning be- 
came an art which devolved on women of shrill 
voices, copious of tears, and skilful in lamenting and 
praising the dead in mournful songs and eulogies. 
On a signal from the chief mourner these mourning 
women took the chief part, and the real mourners 
remained comparatively silent 

So in ancient times. In modern ones, that most 
sedate of people, the Chinese, on the occasion of a 
funeral, burst out into loud shrieks and lamentations. 
All along the Levant, also, the practice of Keening is 
in full vogue. Burckhardt, in his Travels, tells us 
that a particular class of women is called in on the 
occasion of a death, whose sole profession is that of 
howling, in the most heartrending accents, for a small 
sum paid to them by the hour, Medina being the only 
town where this custom did not prevail. At Yembo, 
where the plague was raging, he heard, when he 
retired to rest, innumerable voices breaking out on 
all sides into heartbreaking and dreadful cries, which 
kept him awake the whole night 

Mungo Park also relates that when a person dies 
amongst the Mandingoes, the relations and neigh* 
hours meet together and manifest their sorrow by 
loud bowlings. At one time, when he was a prisoner 
amongst the Moors of Africa, a child died in the 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 307 

next tent, and the mother and relations immediately 
began the death-howL 

Sir James Forbes says, that after the death of a 
Hindoo the house is surrounded by widows hired for 
the purpose, who make loud lamentations, beat their 
breasts in a violent manner, and aflfect every token of 
grief and despair. 

Madame Ida Pfeiffer notes the custom at Jeru- 
salem : — 

* I happened one day to pass a house, from within 
which a great screaming was to be heard. On in- 
quiring of my companion what was the matter, I 
was informed that some person had died in that 
house the day before, and that the sound I heard was 
the wail of Hhe mourning women.' I requested 
admission to the room where the deceased lay. Had 
it not been for the . circumstance that a few pictures 
of saints and a crucifix decorated the walls, I could 
never have imagined that the dead man was a 
Catholic. Several ^ mourning women' sat near the 
corpse, uttering every now and then such frantic 
yells that the neighbourhood rang with their din. 
In the intervals between these demonstrations they 
sat comfortably regaling themselves with coffee ; after 
a little time they would again raise their horriblQ 
cry.' 

And simUarly in Egypt. Miss Martineau records- 

X 2, 



3o8 god's acrk 

*0n our way to the caves in the Djebel (Egypt) we 
met a funeral procession. The women were uttering 
a funeral howl worthy of Ireland.' 

This practice seems, indeed, universal in the East. 
The funerals of most people in decent circumstances 
are attended by singers and howlers. In Cairo, at 
the instant of a man's death (if his property is suffi- 
cient to justify the expense), professional howlers are 
employed. 'I believe,' continues the writer of 
Eothen, ' that these persons are brought near to the 
dying man when his end appears to be approach- 
ing, and the moment that life is gone they lift up 
their voices, and send forth a loud wail from the 
chamber of death/ 

The Soman Mulieres Praeficse, referred to above, 
correspond precisely, it is said, with the women who 
lead the Keen in Ireland, where the outcry is too 
outrageous to be taken as an efPiision of real sorrow. 
The custom is said to be of ancient, indeed of 
supernatural origin, having been first sung by in- 
visible spirits in the air over the grave of one. of 
the early kings of Ireland. So we are told in Mr. 
and Mrs. Hall's Ireland, from which work the follow- 
ing description of the Irish Keen is taken : — 

' The Keen commences. The women of the house- 
hold range themselves on either side of the bed, rise 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 309 

with one accord, and, moving their bodies with a 
slow motion to and fro, their arms apart, they con- 
tinue to keep up a heartrending cry. This cry is 
interrupted for awhile, to give the ban cointhe (the 
leading Keener) an opportunity of commencing. 

* The rapidity and ease with which both the bless- 
ings and curses of the Keen are uttered, and the 
epigrammatic force of each concluding stanza, gene- 
rally bring tears to the eyes of the most indififerent 
spectator, or produce a state of terrible excitement. 
The dramatic efiFect of the scene is very powerfdl : 
the darkness of the death-chamber, illumined only 
by candles that glare upon the corpse — ^the manner 
of repetition or acknowledgment that runs round 
when the Keener gives out a sentence — the deep yet 
suppressed sobs of the nearer relatives, and the 
stormy uncontrollable cry of the widow or bereaved 
husband when allusion is made to the domestic 
virtues of the deceased — ^all heighten the efiFect of the 
Keen. 

' The Keener having finished a stanza of the Keen, 
sete up the wail (indicated in the music by the semi- 
breve at the conclusion), in which all the mourners 
join. Then a momentary silence ensues, when the 
Keener commences again, and so on, each stanza 
ending in the waiL * 

^The lamentation is not always confined to the 



310 god's acre. 

Keener ; any one present who has ' the gift' of poetry 
may put in his or her verse, and this sometimes occurs. 
Thus the night wears away in alternations of lamen- 
tation and silence ; the arrival of each new friend or 
relative being, as already observed, the signal for 
renewing the Keen/ 

From the old classical epithet of * black-veiled 
king of the dead/ one would almost suppose that 
Black had been universally, as with ourselves, the 
mourning colour. Not so, however. Plutarch writes 
that in their mourning women laid aside their purple, 
gold, and jewellery, and clothed themselves in white, 
'like as then the dead body was wrapped in white 
clothes. This colour/ he adds, 'was thought the 
fittest, because it is clear, pure, and sincere, and least 
defiled.' 

So in our own country, some white, an emblem of 
purity, is always displayed on the hearse and pall of 
a child or unmarried person. In the northern parts 
of England indeed, a white linen scarf or hatband 
is an indispensable part of mourning for the d^d 
at any age. 

A curious error has been prevalent, which, if I am 
correct. Miss Strickland was the first to dispel, that 
Henry "VTIL, of uxorious memory, wore white satin 
as mourning for Anne Boleyn. The truth seems to 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 3II 

be that he was hurrying in bridal attire to his queen 
expectant, Jane Seymour. 

Royal personages and Cardinals used to, and for 
aught we know do still, wear purple for mourning. 
This general rule left a wide margin for taste and 
bravery; for in old times the term 'purple' was 
applied to almost any shade from Tyrian scarlet 
through violet to the deepest darkest blue purple. 

Coarse red hempen cloth is the only dress allowed 
in China for the first and deepest mourning. In 
time this is changed to white ; and silk may be worn 
in half-mourning, but blue or white shoes are indis- 
pensable. White being chosen as expressive of the 
belief that the dead are in heaven, the place of 
purity. 

So, more practically in Egypt, yellow, because it 
represents natural decay as exhibited in fruits and 
flowers. Whilst in Turkey blue is often adopted, to 
denote the sky as the place of departed spirits. 

All this, however, whether in good or bad taste, is 
moveable mourning ; but we are told that the first 
duty of the women of Medina on assuming mourning 
is to dye the hands with indigo. 

Far from black being universally mourning, it is 
in Sweden a Court, State, wedding-dress. 

* Madam, you must be in black,' said her hostess 
to a traveller in that country. 



31^ GODS ACRK 

' In black V 

* Yes ; the King and Queen will be there. Wher- 
ever they are there must be black. 

' Black is the State dress of our ladies ; it is worn 
on all grand occasions^ and you must be in black 
when you go to pay a first visit at a house.' 

The same authoress writes — 

*St. Stephen's Day — a festival. On this bright 
day, looking over this charmingly clear and snowy 
prospect, one might fancy that the whole of Stock- 
holm was moving out to a great funeral. Festivities 
in Sweden axe solemn lookmg things. Black is the 
state costume in every sense, and black is still the 
state dress of the plain and lower ranks. Formerly 
it was used at every ceremonial and visit of im- 
portance.' 

At a real Swedish wedding ^a crowd of guests 
came trooping in, the women all in large white 
shawls, and nearly all in black silk dresses. The 
bride, a young, slight, rather delicate-looking girl, 
was dressed in black, with a long sash of white ribbon 
round her waist, and down to her feet.' 

In France and England, however, black is the 
universal mourning colour, and in the former country, 
at any rate, the formalities of grief were of a very 
peculiar nature, for any royal or noble mourner was 



L 



MOURNING CUSTOMS. 313 

compelled to lie in or on bed The higher the rank 
of the person, the longer was this prostration of 
grief expected to continue : it was quite right and 
necessary. I fancy indeed that a ploughman's 
widow might have carried her bursting heart to her 
washing- tub; or a herdsman's daughter might have 
suffered her scorching tears to fall into her milk- 
pans without infringing propriety — lee convenances ; 
but such persons were the mere common earthen- 
ware of the land — with the fine porcelain it was 
different. 

On the death of any royal or noble person, or in- 
deed of one of gentle blood, the nearest of kin always 
went to bed, and there remained — or was supposed to 
remain — a certain number of weeks or days. And if 
the mourner were of the blood-royal the degree of 
affliction to be exhibited was prescribed by authority. 
It is to be hoped the saying is true that * people who 
cry in velvet always shed rosewater tears.' 

For instance, in the fifteenth century a Queen of 
France was required to confine herself to her bed- 
chamber^or, as I say, appear to do so— for one year 
from the time of her royal husband's death. 

There is a work of the same century, entitled Lcb 
Honneura de la Cour, from which I have seen 
extracts, though I have not been able to obtain the 
perusal of the volume. The following description is 



314 GODS ACRE. 

taken from it of the mourning of the Princess de 
Charolois for her fiitber, the Due de Bourbon : — 

^ As soon as she heard the news, she shut herself 
up in her chamber for six weeks, remaining con- 
stantly on a bed covered with white linen, and rest- 
ing on pillow& She wore her stomacher, her cloak, 
and hood, which were lined with minever, and the 
said cloak had a long train ; and at the borders and 
before the hood, for the breadth of a palm, the 
minever was curled outwards. The chamber was 
hung with black cloth, as was also the outer ona' 

It is some relief to find that 'Quand Madame 
estoit en son particulier, elle n'estoit point toujours 
couch^e, ni en une chambra' 

Affliction being, as I have said, proportionately 
softened as lofty rank graduated to a lower level, 
Peeresses were required to lie in bed only nine days ; 
but for the remainder of the six weeks so passed by 
royalty, these mitigated mourners were to sit in front 
of their beds ' upon a piece of black clotL' 

These forms and ceremonies were in no degree 
relaxed in the Court of Louis XIY., that autocrat of 
etiquette. * Princesses were still obliged to grieve in 
bed/ 

Mourning in our own country is regulated now by 
a power hardly less stringent than those laws by 



MOUBNING CUSTOMS. 315 

which the royalty and noblesse of France used to be 
governed. This power is Custom or Fashion, as you 
may please to call it, and its ministers and dis- 
pensers are the satellites of our Maisons de Deuil, 
where they have the 'melancholy-pleasure-of-showing- 
you' every degi*ee of outward sorrow, from the 
deepest widowhood through the various 'mitigated 
aflSiction' departments, ' small by degrees and beauti- 
fully less,' to the lightest wreath of complimentary 
violets and love ribbon. I am told that in each 
department of such mourning Depositories an at- 
tendant is stationed, a sort of living lay figure, 
dressed in costume suitably assimilated to the 
bereavement that room is intended to exemplify ; a 
sort of 'glass of fashion' in which you are instructed 
as to the degree of grief you ought to exhibit — 
whether as a new-made widow in her deepest weeds, 
a bereaved daughter, an affectionate sister, or a com- 
plimentary cousin. 

We cannot say with Hamlet — 

'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother. 
Nor customary suit of solemn black— 

for it is all that — it is the ' customary' suit, and 
often nothing else. 

Oh, what a mockery it all seems I 

That there is to the most earnest mourner a feeling 
somewhat consolatory, or at least soothing, in a 



3i6 god's acre. 

mourning robe, there is no question ; but it is the 
black, the mourning, the change from gay attire and 
jewellery to something completely opposite — some- 
thing whose dim hue assimilates with the shadow on 
the heart that is sought. One truly sorrowing, cares 
little about tucks ' graduated' to a shade in crape, or 
silk just as much glacS' sub modem fashion allows to 
mingle with that lugubrious ornament. 

It is right that those who can afford * the pomp 
and circumstance' of woe, and who are comforted 
thereby, should have that solace to its utmost extent ; 
whether the pomp be displayed in Chinese red 
cotton, or English crape-robed mutes and weepera 
It is wrong that this pomp and circumstance should 
be so engrafted on our national habits, that the des* 
titute widow, the penniless orphan, or unportioned 
sister must cruelly embarrass themselves to obtain 
the precise vestments which custom dictates, or be 
supposed to fail in respect to the husband, the father, 
the brother whom they loved in their heart of hearts, 
and to a reunion with whom they look as their 
chiefest hope and comfort. 

The mourning which Christ hath hallowed — ^for 
He wept for Lazarus — ^has no communion with 
crape bands and weepers. There is no teacher like 
Death. In his dread presence the great mystery of 
life opens on the sorrowing heart, the awaJ^ened 



MOUENING CUSTOMS. 317 

mind. He teaches that faith and hope by which the 
bruised reed is bound, the broken heart healed ; and 
as fragrance, which in its perfectness was unknown, 
emanates from a herb, when it is crushed, so does 
sorrow develop virtues and consolations undreamt of 
in gay and happy Lours. 

Thus does the faithful mourner learn that sorrow, 
and pain, and suflfering— those * many waters' which 
threatened but did not overwhelm — ^passed, the puri- 
fied and renewed spirit will emerge on that happier 
shore where sin and sorrow are unknown, where tears 
are wiped from every eye, and where the toilwom, 
griefwom, stricken but contrite denizen of earth, shall 
stand blessed, pure, and happy as a little child in 
presence of his Creator. 

And so, chastened and subdued, and passing 

Cheerly on 
Through prayer unto the tomb, 

the true mourner looks beyond that solemn vestibule 

to reunion with those deeply and enduringly loved on 

earth, who are — ^not lost — but gone before. 

Bead Bishop Mant's beautiful exposition of this 

hope : — 

There is a void in torn aflfection's heart 
That yearns to be supplied, on God's high will 
Though it repose submissively. Yet still 
Of those who bore of its regards a part, 



3i8 god's acbe. 

The cherished forms it holds as in a chart 
Depicted — ^hoping He will yet ftdfil 
Their restitution. Pardon it, if ill 
Lurk in this hope. Great Father ! true Thou art, 
Thou sayest the just shall bliss in fulness prove ; 
And what Thou sayest, Thy goodness will provide. 
But yet, meseems, the blissful souls above, 
The sense of earth's sweet charities denied. 
Would feel a yearning in those realms of love, 
By patriarch hosts and angels unsupplied. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

FUNERAL DOLES — FUNERAL TAPERS — THE FIRST 
FUNERAL AFTER THE REFORMATION. * 

TN all ages and countries it seems to have been 
-*■ usual to provide some specific feast or refresh- 
ment on the occasion of a funeral. Among the Jews 
it appears to have been doubly beneficent in its pur- 
pose, the neighbours and friends of the deceased pro- 
viding these refreshments, so that there should be no 

trouble of preparation added to the burden of grief 
in the domestic dwelling of the mourner. * Pour out 
thy bread,' says Tobit, ' on the burial of the just / 
and there are other references in Scripture which 
sufficiently indicate the prevalence of this custom 
among the Jews. It was by them beautifully termed 
the * bread of consolation.' 

Among the Greeks and Bomans these funeral 
refreshments became sumptuous banquets; and at 
the funeral of Scipio all who followed were addi- 
tionally refreshed with wine at the Capenian Gate. 
It was usual to place a portion of the banquet on the 
tomb for the behoof of the poor and starving, who 
afterwards carried it away ; aud this redeeming cir- 



320 GODS ACRE. 

cumstance is said to have reconciled the early fathers 
of the Church to the continuance of the mortuary 
feasts in Christian practice. 

That it was customary to add more substantial 
alms to the food we learn from one in early Chris- 
tian times, who wrote to his mother that the alms to 
be given on his death should be bestowed on those 
who had never seen the miseries of this world, and 
who had never lost those who were dear to them. 
The mother, as we jnay suppose, sought such objects 
in vain ; and eventually applied the lesson, as it was 
intended, to her own consolation. 

From the first institution of Christianity, it was 
the custom to bestow food and other alms on the 
poor at a funeral Saint Chrysostom says in one of his 
homilies, * Would you honour the dead ? Give alms.' 

The early Christians were accustomed to observe 
several especial days of mourning with psalms, lessons, 
and prayers offered up at the grave of the dead man. 

The third day, because on that our Saviour rose 
from the dead ; the ninth day was often especially 
kept also. The fortieth, from the precedent of the 
Israelites mourning for Moses forty days ; and finally 
the anniversary, called not his deaih but his hvrth 
day, because on that he entered a brighter and better 
world. 

This festival was quite of a religious character, 




FUNERAL DOLES. . 31^1 

generally at the tomb of the deceased. There was 
Divine Service ; the Holy Sacrament was adminis- 
tered, and a collection of alms made for the poor. 
Then was a feast shared both by clergy and people, 
but more especially bestowed on the poor and needy, 
on the widow and orphan. The softening influence of 
grief was ever directed by the Church into the heart- 
opening channels of charity and good will. In time 
the amount and quality of such Doles came to be 
specifically described and appointed in the Will of a 
dying person. 

Nothing with the taint of this earth upon it can 
escape desecration — abuse — however pure and proper 
in origin and intention. It has ever been so. And 
in no circumstance perhaps has this desecration been 
more openly displayed than in the perversion of the 
original usage of Jewish * bread of consolation,' where 
friends not only supplied the family with that material 
food, which in no circumstances can human nature 
quite disregard, but which is often so painful *to see 
about,' but also provided requisite refreshment for 
those who often with toil and inconvenience assembled 
to the burial. 

That this requisite refreshment degenerated into 
superb festivals among the Greeks and Romans, we 
can hardly wonder ; but it is very sad to read of and 
see such in our own Christian world. 

T 



329 god's acre. 

Yet to sucli an extent did funeral feasts progress in 
England, that it is recorded that it was less expensive 
to portion a daughter than to bury a wife. But it 
needs not to go to the pages of antiquarians to testify 
to this. Such reckless extravagance is, or was, twenty 
years ago, common in Cumberland : where everybody 
known to the deceased is invited, and everybody un- 
known, welcomed ; where the house being not large 
enough to contain a tithe of the guests, all the various 
barns and outhouses of a substantial farm-steading 
are pressed into the service ; where the temporary 
tables groan under the weight of substantial viands, 
and ale, and rum, and whisky fly like water ; where 
feasting begins early in the day. and some leave the 
tables to attend the funeral, and some do not; where, 
after the holy service, feasting is renewed, and results 
may be guessed. And all this because, otherwise, you 
would be burying your relative stingily. 

This I knew, twenty years ago, in Cumberland ; 
and perhaps a few quotations from my Diaiy of that 
time may not be inappUcable here. 

The invitations given by the friends of a deceased 
person to the funeral here (in Gurnierland) are not 
merely numerous, they are general and universal. I 
have myself heard the following announcement by a 
Town Crier, whose bell called the attention of passen- 
gers at a market town in. that county : — 




FUNERAL DOLES. 3^3 

'I give notice that all friends and relations are 
requested to attend the funeral of Mary Lavery, of 
New Town, at the Old Church, to-morrow, at two 
o'clock/ 

In the neighbouring county, Northumberland, the 
announcement was (and probably still is) somewhat 
more formal : — 

* ' Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord.' 
Joseph Dixon is departed, son of Christopher Dixon 
was. Company is desired to-morrow at five o'clock, and 
at six he is to be buried. For him and all faithful 
people give God most hearty thanks.' 

Sir John Sinclair, in his Statistical Account of 
Scotland, mentions a similar custom in the county of 
Linlithgow. 

This custom is probably derived from the Ro- 
mans, by whom a public crier was sent about 
inviting people to the solemnization of the funeral, 
thus : — 

^Exequiaa L, Titfilii, quibus est commodum ire 
jam tempus est Olus ex cedibus affertor' 

In some villages in the Northern Counties, they have 
still regular 'Bidders' as they are called, who, on 
occasion of a death, knock at the door of every house 
without exception. I perfectly well remember 
receiving the following announcement one day on 
opening my own door — 

T 7, 



rK^'wrnrz 



3^4 god's acbe. 

'The widow Russell bids you to her husband's 
funeral to-morrow/ 

In some places, as in Durham, the Bidders knock 
on the door with a key, not daring to use the rapper, 
as it is considered unlucky to do so on these occasions ; 
but this superstition was not prevalent where I 
resided. 

As the time for the funeral approaches, a table 
covered with a white linen cloth is placed outside the 
house door, and on it is a basin of water containing 
sprigs of boxwood and rosemary. This, * for remem- 
brance,' is a relic of a very ancient custom. No 
person crosses the threshold without taking one of 
these sprigs, which he bears in his hand. A little 
spiced wine is handed round to the assembled com- 
pany, and then the train proceeds to church, the 
numerous attendants forming companionship as they 
please ; but invariably, of course, leaving place at the 
head of the procession for the more intimate friends 
of the mourner& Many accompany the funeral only 
a few yards, and gradually drop away ; nor is this 
considered at all out of course or disrespectful^ for the 
compliment of oMendance has been paid. 

It is when a death takes place at a sequestered 
residence, detached by an interval of perhaps several 
nules from other habitations, or from the church to 
which the frineral is destined, that opportunity is 



FUNEEAL DOLES. 3^5 

given for that excess which frequently disgraces these 
solemn occasions; and where, in the absence of 
absolute excess, a cheerful hilarity pervades a scene 
with which anything like social merriment is certainly 
inconsistent. Hundreds are frequently assembled 
from different quarters for miles around. There is 
abundant wealth of beef, ham, bacon, mutton-ham, 
fowls, and other such sufficing refreshment ; and 
spirits (usually smuggled) fly about merrily ; and 
mirth too often becomes uproarious, and excess sadly 
degrading. Everybody invited or uninvited who 
chooses to go is welcomed and feasted. 

However little the ability of the entertainers may 
keep pace with their inclination, they are in a manner 
obliged to do this ; since the feelings and habits of 
the district would seem to cast a reproach on them 
otherwise. Some hours are spent in what may fairly 
be termed jovial conviviality before the funeral takes 
place ; and we are not far from the truth when we 
remark that many who go ostensibly to attend a 
funeral, have in reality no such object in view. This, 
like many other customs of the county, is but a relic 
of that which anciently pervaded the whole island ; 
' when funeral entertainments were carried to such a 
pitch, that, as I have remarked, it was considered less 
expensive to portion a daughter than to bury a wife ; 
and we are told that all the wealth a dead man left 



3^6 god's acre. 

behind him was not infrequently expended on an ex- 
travagant entertainment at his funeral.^ 

But I return from this digression to the subject of 
the Doles formerly usual at Funerals. 

The most usual form of gift seems to have been a 
robe or dress, accompanied by a certain portion of 
money. 

Eleanor, Duchess of Gloucester, in 1399, appointed 
that fifteen poor men should bear torches at her 
funeral, each having a gown and hood lined with white, 
breeches of blue cloth, shoes, and a shirt, and twenty 
pounds amongst them. 

Sir John Devereux, in 1385, omitted the garment. 



^ In Yorkshire, iu Haworth and the districts around, the old 
custom of 'Arvills/ or funeral feasts, led to frequent pitched 

battles between the drunken mourners The sexton, 

standing at the foot of the open grave, announced that the 
' Arvill* would be held at the Black Ball, or whatever public- 
house might be fixed upon by the firiends of the dead; and 

thither the mourners and their acquaintance repaired 

Among the poor the mourners were only expected to provide a 
kind of spiced roll for each person; and the expense of the 
liquors — rum, or ale, or a mixture of both, called *dog*s-nose* — 
was generally defrayed by each guest placing some money on a 
plate set in the middle of the table. Richer people would order 

dinner for their friends As few ' shirked their liquor,' 

there were very frequently 'up-and-down fights' before the close 
of the day ; sometimes with the horrid additions of ' pawsing,' 
and * gouging,' and biting. — Life of Charlotte Bronte, 



hi 



FUNERAL BOLES. 3^7 

but appointed a sum to be paid to his torch-bearers, 
and a further dole of one penny each to be given to 
any poor man coming to his funeral. 

Thomas, Lord Poynings, in 14^8, appointed twelve 
poor people to bear torches at his funeral, and each 
to have a gown of black cloth, and i2d. in money. 

At a rather earlier period (141 1) Joan, Lady Hun- 
gerford, appointed poor women to bear torches, and 
each to be dad in russet, with linen hoods, stockings 
and shoes. 

Twenty-eight poor men who attended with torches 
the funeral of Andrew, Lord Windsor, in 1543, had 
each a gown of frieze and sixpence. 

Often, doles were appointed in perpetuity. There 
are scores of Charities in England where certain doles 
of herrings, bread, or other food or clothing, are pe- 
riodically distributed to the poor, which had their 
origin in the times whereof we are speaking ; some, 
in later ones. 

At Felsted, in Essex, throughout the whole sea- 
son of Lent, a liberal dole of herrings, red and white, 
is given weekly to every poor parishioner. There is 
a monthly dole of bread also. This is the case in 
many parishes, and it is usually or frequently dis- 
pensed by the Clergyman himself after Divine Service. 

Betham, in his Baronetagey gives a detailed ac- 
count of a dole of bread instituted by the wife of 



3^8 gob's acrk 

Sir Roger de Tichbume, of Hampshire, 'a valiact 
and daring knight' in the reign of Henry II. 

' This dame Mabell, being bedridden, and extremely 
ill, petitioned her husband for the means of institut- 
ing a dole of bread, to be given to all poor persons 
who might ask for it, on every succeeding Lady Day. 
In return he promised her as much ground as she 
could walk round in the neighbourhood of the house 
should be appropriated to the aforesaid purpose ; on 
which she caused herself to be taken out of bed, and 
carried to a choice piece of ground of several acres 
extent, on the north-east side the mansion-house, and 
there, on her hands and knees, contrived to crawl 
round it, from which circumstance it has retained the 
name of Crawls to the present day/ 

On the original weight, still existent, of this dole 
bread is engraven on one side Fundatum Henrico 
regrvante Secundo; and on the other, TicKbome 
dole weight iU>. looz, avoir:. It was generally the 
custom to bake about I200 of these loaves, and if any 
people remained unserved each received twopence. 
People came from all quarters for it, and vagabonds 
would begin to congregate in the neighbourhood a 
week before the appointed time ; and it became a 
scene of such riot and confusion, fighting and quar- 
relling, that about fifty years ago it was discontinued. 

It is said that old people used to preserve it with 



FUNERAL DOLES. 329 

great care, as a specific in ague and other disorders. 
There is a tradition that the dole was once discon- 
tinued, and the house sunk ; and there is an old pro- 
phecy that should the dole be given up, the family 
would soon be extinct, and the house fall to ruins. 

There was a Dole at Walsall, in Staffordshire, on 
Twelfth Eve, which originated in a curious circum- 
stance. The donor, Thomas Moseley, passing through 
Walsall on Twelfth Eve, saw a child crying for bread, 
where others were feasting, and struck by the cir- 
cumstance, made over certain estates to the town, on 
condition that, every year, one penny should be given 
to each person on that day, that no one should here- 
after witness a like sadness. 

The dole is discontinued, and almshouses are built 
in lieu of it. 

In like manner it is told that early in the thir- 
teenth century a Seigneur de Romilly, who dwelt at 
Bomilly sur Seine, observing at the service on Easter 
Day that the greatest part of the inhabitants were 
neither present at mass nor vespers, was told on in- 
quiry that the famine then existing had compelled 
them to go to neighbouring places to beg alms. He 
at once made over the tenths of Romilly to the Abbey 
at Seelbiers, on condition that every Easter Sunday 
all the inhabitants of Bomilly should have an abun- 
dant dole of bread. This charity was duly distri- 



^%i' 



330 god's acbe. 

buted until the general overthrow of ancient institu- 
tions in France. 

King Edward I., when he founded Obits for his 
Queen Eleanor^ in Westminster Abbey, provided also 
that money should be given to the poor that came to 
the solemnization of the same. 

Bang Henry V. appointed a weekly dirge and mass 
to be celebrated in Westminster Abbey for the soul 
of King Bichard II. ; and he appointed that on each 
of these days 63. 8d, should be given to the poor 
people, and on his anniversary 20I, in pence dis- 
tributed to the most needy.^ 

The usage of doles at funerals seems now to be 
quite discontinued. 

Availing myself of the privilege I early claimed 
not to be tied to the strict letter of my subject, but to 
introduce matter which, if somewhat irrelevant, I 
judge may be interesting to my readers, I give here 
an extract on the subject, not of Mortuary Doles, but 
of accustomed royal Alms. It is taken from the In- 
troduction to the Wardrobe Accounts of the aSth 
year of the reign of Edward I. 

^la the article of Alms we find our Kings bur- 



^ At the funeral of the anfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots, a 
hundred poor women attended as mourners. 



FUNERAL "DOLES. 33 1 

thened, by cmdent (mstom^ with the maintenance 
of many thouBand paupers, in honour of particular. 
Saints, on their respective festivals, from 300 to 500 
and ^2400 per week, throughout the year, at i^d, per 
head a day, besides private al/ms given in the lump. 

' At the close of some weeks is a charge of 9c2., I2c2., 
or i7dl., given to sick persons who had received the 
King's benediction, or i» we should now say been 
favoured with the roydi touch. 

'666 is the prevailing number of poor thus main- 
tained every week. On some days which do not 
seem appropriated to any Saint, this is called private 
dl/ms; and on some Sundays^ when the King did Twb 
go to Chapel, 100 poor were relieved. The first of 
these allowances is de custuma antiqua ; the other, 
per preceptv/m regis. There is one week in which 
the last is omitted. In Lent 13 poor are maintained, 
ratione jejunii, besides 13 more in honor of the 
Apostles. On Monday, April 24, being St Mark 
the Evangelist's Day, 500, and the same day 1700 
more, because Edward the King's son on that day 
entered into his lyth year. 

'The number of poor every Sunday and the 
whole week ensuing (per diem dominicam et per 
tota/m septi/numa/m sequentem) amounts to 341632, 
not to mention the great numbers on particular Saints 
Days,, who, altogether, amount to above 100,000, 



I i 



332 GODS ACRE. 

unless we suppose them always the same persons ; 
and the money expended in this charitable provision 
amounts to 655?. 38. 8 Jdl. 

' To these items of Alms are subjoined Offerings at 
Shrines, &c/ 

In the Chapter on Christian Burial a brief reference 
was made to the custom of carrying lights before the 
dead as emblematic of the glorified existence to 
which they were passing. 

* Singinge, bearinge of lightes, and other like cere- 
monies as were used in their Buringes and FuneraUes, 
were ordeyned, or rather permitted and suffred by 
y® auncient Bishoppes and Pastours, for to aboUsh, 
put downe, and dryve awai the superstition and 
ydolatri y* the heathen and paynymes used about 
their dead : and not for anye opinion y* they had 
y* such things could profite the Soules departed, as it 
doth manifestly appear by their owne writinges/ 

The body of St. Cyprian was buried in the night, 
with lights and torches. But St. Jerome states that 
lights were used not to drive away darkness, but to 
give a demonstration of their joy for the good news 
of the Gospel, to be a corporal symbol of that light of 
which the Psalmist speaks, ' Thy word is a lamp to 
my feet and a light unto my path,' 

Gregory of Nyssen says of his sister Macrina (men- 



FUNERAL TAPEBS. 333 

tioned . elsewhere), that * the clergy went before the 
corpse, carrying lighted torches in their hands/ The 
Bishops of Palestine did the like at the funeral of the 
Lady Paula. 

It is said, that at the funeral of St. German, Bishop 

« 

of Auxerre, ' the multitude of lights seemed to outdo 
the sun, and beat back its rays at noon-day.^ 

That this syrribol of lights degenerated into abuse 
is very evident. 

In an old manuscript which lays down rules for 
the proper ordering of funerals there is this : — 

' Item, a certeyn of innocentes all clothed in white, 
ev'y innocent beryng a taper in his hande' — ^the term 
innocentes meaning, doubtless, children. 

But from this originally simple and becoming 
custom sprang vast offshoots of pomp, expense, and 
ostentation. A Chambre Ardente, or Burning Chapel, 
so called from a blaze of lights, was indispensable to 
the funeral of a person of rank or note. 

A few references to this custom of lights as prac- 
tically exhibited will perhaps be interesting. 

By the will of William de Montacute, Earl of 
Salisbury, 1397 — ' Twenty-four poor people, clothed 
in black gowns and red hoods, are ordered to attend 
the Funeral, each carrying a lighted torch of eight 
pounds weight.' 

Dr. Pegge observes (speaking of the torches in the 



334 god's acre. 

Churcliwardens' Accounts of St Margaret^ West- 
minster, anno 1460) , * Little was done in these ages of 
gross popery without lights. These torches cost I8. 8d. 
a piece ; but we find them of various prices^ according, 
as we may suppose, to their size. The Churchwardens 
appear to have provided them, and consequently they 
were an article of profit to the Church/ The Editor 
adds, ^ These torches, it is conceived, are made of wax, 
which in ordinary cases were let out by the Church, 
and charged to the party according to the consump- 
tion at the moment/ 

This appears, indeed, in the York Churchwardens' 
Accounts, where wax is charged. 

In the Funeral Expenses of John Waynflete, in 
148 1, is this item : — 

'It: to iiij frat' nytees for waste of tJuiir torches, 

• • • • • 
mj8. 

Eleanor, Duchess of Gloucester, 13999 appointed 
that fifteen poor men, to whom she bequeathed a 
handsome dole, should bear a torch at her funeral 

Jane, Lady Cobbam, by will, 1369, and Thomas, 
Lord Poynings, 14^8, both appointed torches and 
doles to the bearers. 

An Earl of Suffolk, 1381, directed that five square 
tapers, four mortars, and forty-eight torches should 
be borne at his funeral by as many poor men, clothed 
in white. 



y 



FUNERAX TAPERS. 335 

Andrew, Lord Windsor, 1543, appointed that 
twenty-four torches with four great tapers should be 
borne by twenty-eight men about his hearse. 

Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, 1426, was 
earnest in directing that no sumptuous or excessive 
cost should be expended on his funeral He directed 
that five tapers on candlesticks should be placed 
about his corpse, as many torches during mass, and 
that as many poor men as he shoyld be years of age 
at the time of his death should carry a torch at his 
funeral. These poor men were each to receive a 
gown and hood of white cloth, and as many pence as 
he himself had lived years. At a later period (1524), 
Edward, Earl of Gloucester, ordered that there should 
be no expense for hearse, wax, or other funeral 
accompaniments, more than 'Tnuat Tieeds be had' 
Therefore, only twenty torches were borne, and those 
by his own men. 

At the funerals of royal personages this illumina- 
tion was, of course, carried to a higher pitch of display 
and magnificence. At the funeral of Richard II. 
one hundred men clothed in black each bore a torch, 
in addition to thirty Londoners in white, who carried 
torches also. The darling of the country. King 
Henry V., was borne in solemn procession from the 
coast to Westminster, a great number of men clothed 
in white, bearing torches. 



33^ god's acre. 

In every chamber where the corpse of King 
Henry VII. rested, a great hearse of wax^ was placed, 
and six hundred torches were borne round the body 
on its removal. 

There is an entry in the accounts of the Friare 
Predicants of London for 778. 6d, for laolbs. of wax 
to bum about the heart of Queen Eleanor (which I 
have elsewhere said was deposited here) on the day 
of her Anniversary^ 

The King, her husband, Edward I., was quite pro- 
fuse in his gifts to the monks of Westminster, to 
secure in the Church a splendid and perpetual com- 
memoration. 

In Dugdale's MoTKisticon there is a register of his 
magnificent gifts of manors and lands on condition 
* that the Abbot, Prior, and Convent should celebrate 
the anniversary every year on the Eve of St. Andrew 
the Apostle, in the Choir of their Church, being 
solemnly invested, singing Placebo and Dirige with 
nine lessons, one hundred wax candles weighing 
I albs, (each) being then burning about the tomb. 
The candles were to be lighted on the eve of the 

^ That is a pall placed on framework, decorated with banners, 
and covered with lights, underneath which the coffin was placed. 
They were called in the time of Edward III. castra doloris. 
The present name of hearse, as applied to the vehicle containing 
the corpse, was adopted in the reign of William and Mary. 



▲ 



FUNEBAL TAPEBS, 337 

anniversary, and to born all day till high mass was 
ended; all the bells^ both great and small, were 
to be rung, and the Convent was to sing solemnly for 
her soul's health,' &c} 

Penny dole was to be given to seven score poor 
people present at the solemnity. 

Thirty of the wax-tapers were to remain all year 
long about the tomb, all of which were to burn on 
festival days ; and two tapers were to be constantly 
kept burning. 

There are some very interesting engravings in the 
Vetusta Monumenta, showing the lying-in-state, the 
funeral, and the tomb of Islip, Abbot of Westminster 
in the reign of Henry VII., with whom he was a 
great favourite. Islip laid the first stone of the ornate 
chapel which bears the astute monarch's name. 

One of these engravings represents the deceased 
prelate's bier in the Choir before the High Altar, on a 
frame entirely open at the sides, so as fully to display 
the coffin. On four light shafted pillars rises, in a 
conical shape, a sort of framework roof, beautifully 
ornamented, which is literally covered with lights — a 
blading forest of wax-taper& Bending at the head 
of the coffin are three mourners closely veiled and 



^ At ihe first anniTersary (for the above-mentioned gift was in 
the aeoond year) 37o61b8. of wax were bought for the ocoAsidn, 

Z 



338 god's acre. 

muffled, and all around the hearse are men — ^oor 
men probably — some standing, some kneeling, and 
all bearing enormous tapers. 

Another engraving exhibits the beautiful table- 
tomb of the Abbot, beneath which lies his effigy, his 
hands folded, and his pastoral staff laid on his arm. 

It may not be an uninteresting close to this broken 
chapter to quote an authentic account of the first 
'reformed funeral' in England. It was always custo* 
mary formerly to have a funeral service in memory 
of any distinguished personage, though not of our 
own country ; as was indeed recently the case in 
some Boman Catholic countries on the death of the 
Duke of Wellington. 

The service, remarkable as being the first of its 
kind in England, was in memory of Henry II., King 
of France,^ when ' the Queen, according to the custom 
of princes in showing honour to each other even at 
their deaths,' appointed his obsequies to be solemnly 
observed in the chief church of her realm, St. Paul's 
Cathedral, London. 

*0n Friday, September 8, when the hearse was 
solemnly brought into the church, and every man 
placed, whereas the ancient custom was for one of 



> Somber 8, 1559. ^he Eing met his death in Jnlj. 




-■»- 



i0eBRseiW99*ava5SQ5OT9s»Q99«a«v^s!^ I ji..j4^ij ■ . 



THE FIRST REFOBMED FUNERAL. 339 

the heralds to bid aloud the prayer for the soul of the 
party departed, saying, ' Pray for the soul of,' &c., 
now there was an alteration in the worda For York 
Herald, standing at the upper Choir door, bad the 
prayer (as it used to be called, but now more properly 
the praise) first in English, and after in French, 
* Benoist soit Etemel,' &c., * Blessed be the King of 
Eternal Glory, who through His divine mercy hath 
translated the most High, Puissant^ and Victorious 
Prince Henry II., late the French King, from this 
earthly to His Heavenly kingdom/ Which words he 
used again at the end of the Benedictus, and the end 
of the service ; and again on the morrow, at the times 
accustomed. The Archbishop of Canterbury, in his 
surplice and Doctor's hood on his shoulders, who did 
execute, began the service, assisted by the Bishops of 
Chichester and Hereford, apparelled as the Arch- 
bishop, and by two of the Prebendaries in their grey 
amices. And first, certain Psalms of praise were 
sung for the departure of the dead in the faith of 
Christ, instead, I suppose, of the Dirige. After that, 
one chapter of the Book of Job (perhaps taken out 
of the Dirige), and then certain like Psalms. And 
after that was read the fifteenth chapter of the first 
Epistle to the Corinthians. Which ended, Magnificat 
was sung. And lastly, the latter part of the Evening 
Prayer. All things ended, they returned in like 



340 god's acee. 

order as they came (except the banner left in the 
Church) to the great chamber within the Bishop's 
Palace, where they had a void of wine and spices, and 
other things. And after they had taken order to 
meet there again by 8 of the clock in the morning, 
they shifted them and departed, 

'Saturday, September 9, about the hour assigned 
they met together at the said Bishop's Palace ; and 
about 9 of the clock they proceeded up to the hearse 
as the day before ; and all being placed as before, 
the three Bishops elect in copes, and the two Pre- 
bendaries in grey amices, came forth of the vestry 
unto the Table of Administration, and then York 
Herald bad the prayer as befora Then the Commu- 
nion Office began and proceeded forward until the 
offering; when the Chief Mourner proceeded, the 
Officer of Arms and Gentleman Usher before him, 
with his train borne, the rest of the Mourners foUow- 
ing him, but he alone offered, being a piece of gold 
for the head penny, and he and others returned to 
the end of the service. Then the said Chief Mourner, 
with Clarencieux before him, again proceeded up 
without any state, and offered for himself and re- 
turned to his place. Then the Lord Chamberlain, 
and the Lord of Burgavenny, with two Heralds 
before them, proceeded up and offered and returned 
ftnd took their places. In which like order offered 



i> .« 




THE FIBST, REFORMED FUNERAL, 34I 

all the other eight Mourners, two after two. The 
money for them to offer had been before delivered 
to them by the Gentleman Usher. Then offered the 
Ambassador of the French King. Then the Lord 
Mayor, with his brethren, followed him, but offered 
not, &c. &c. 

' The offering finished, the sermon was preached by 
the Bishop elect of Hereford — he of London being sick. 

' The learned Divine ' declared and proved the last 
day not to be far off.' Whence he persuaded amend- 
ment of life : and curtailed as these rites and ceremonies 
were comparatively, there being yet a party who 
thought them far too many, he endeavoured to re- 
concile these differences of opinion by showing ' out 
of divers ancient authors, the order of the Burial of 
the Dead in the Primitive Church, and how the service 
at the same was to give praise to Qod for taking away 
their brother in the faith of Christ' Freely abjuring 
some ancient ceremonies as ^neither beneficial to those 
which were alive, nor yet to the parties deceased,' he 
advocated the retention of others, as becoming and as 
conducing to the maintenance of brotherly and 
Christian charity. 

* Finally he pronounced a eulogy on the royal 
person departed, together ^ with great commendation 
of his chaste life, keeping himself only to his own 
wife, being a rare thing/ he said, * in princes.' 



• ■ w 



342 qob's acbi; 

*Then those of the nobles who 'were not yet so 
well reconciled to the new way of receiving the 
Sacrament' declined to communicate with the Bishops 
and others. 

' All returned to the Bishop's Palace in order, where 
they were treated with a goodly dinner, and so 
departed at pleasure/ 




CHAPTER XIV. 

EXHUMATION. 

* T^HE number of the dead/ says Sir Thomas 
-*- Browne, *long exceedeth all that shall live.' 
Even so long ago as the time of St Dunstan that 
prelate was heard to say of the Cathedral of Canter- 
bury that you could not set foot either in the Church 
or the Cemetery without treading on the remains of 
some Saints : and I remember reading an ingenious 
essay which showed that we could hardly step in 
London without, in all probability, treading on 
human dust — on the mouldered, scattered, changed 
dust of those ' who have suffered and sorrowed before 
us.' It were an inquiry useless and unsatisfactory to 
attempt to trace the fate of one thousandth part of 
the myriads of monuments erected in the futile hope 
of sheltering for ever the mortal remains of the 
occupants. Unhallowed curiosity has been a bitterer 
enemy than war, and greediness of gain, hope of 
plunder, has caused the desecration of more tombs 
than the so-called ' ruthless destroyer," Time. Time 
hallows even whilst he desecrate& His * robe of deep 



344 god's acbel 

sepulchral green,' his ' mantle of decay/ do gradually 
enclose and extend over, and cover defeature^ until 
Oblivion hath swept all painful record away. 

This is the natural, the providential course of 
things. For much that is otherwise man has to thank 
his own vanity, * pompous in the grave/ The Egyptian 
mummy-tombs have excited alike the researches of 
the scientific and the desecration of the curious. The 
treasure-tombs of antiquity have aroused the cupidity 
of the avaricious in all subsequent time& 

It was the custom in the remotest times to bury 
treasure and rich ornaments with the dead ; it had 
become usual also among Christian princes in the 
fifth century. The sepulchres of the Kings of Israel 
have been celebrated, whether justly or not, for the 
treasure enclosed in them ; and according to Josephus, 
that of David was plundered by Hyrcanus and 
Herod. The tomb of Cyrus is supposed to have 
been fuU of gold and silver. It is possible that Darius 
had previously made free with this treasure, for when 
Alexander opened the sepulchre he foimd nothing 
worth abstracting. This same monarch, Darius, 
broke open the tomb of Nitocris, Queen of Babylon, 
which she had prepared for herself over one of the 
gates of the City. By some this action is ascribed to 
his desire that the people should no longer be deprived 
of the use of the gate, for at that aera no one would 



I • ' » » • 



EXHUMAtlOlT. 345 

willingly pass under a dead body ; by others it is 
said that he sought a treasure supposed to be con- 
cealed there. If so he was disappointed. He found 
a label with this rebuke : — 

'Hadst thou not been insatiieibly covetous and 
greedy of the most sordid gain, thou wouldst not have 
violated the sepulchre of the dead/ 

It was the hope of treasure that induced the 
Emperor Alexius Angelus to break open the tombs of 
his predecessors, and especially that of Constantine 
the Great ; but the result was not successful. With 
regard to Alaric, King of the Goths, one is perplexed 
whether most to marvel at the folly of so burying 
wealth, or the barbarity attending the procedure. The 
bed of the river Busentia, near Cosenza, was laid bare, 
and there was Attila buried with an immense quantity 
of treasure* Then the river was turned back again 
into its channel, and all the labourers concerned in the 
work were put to death. 

Some similar means are said to have been resorted 
to by Odo, the brother of the Norman Conqueror, to 
secure, during his absence from the kingdom, the 
wealth which he had, not too justly, amassed. 

Under Cassar, when the Bomans began to rebuild 
Corinth, the soldiers, accidentally opening a grave in 
which they found brazen and earthen vessels, broke 
open every grave in Corinth ] for these tilings were 



34^ qod's acre. 

highly prized, and in a short time Borne was filled 
with them as articles of sale. 

The folly of depositing things of value with the 
dead is seen in the temptation to spoliation it has 
offered to ruffians who have been found in every class 
of civilized Ufa ' Where profit hath prompted, no 
age hath wanted such miners. For which the most 
barbarous expilators found the most civil rhetorick/ 

The tomb of Charles the Great was rifled by the 
Emperor Otho III. of the gold cross which was hung 
firom the neck of the dead monarch. What punish- 
ment had been deemed adequate to the enormity of 
the crime had the culprit been of lower degree? 

The leaden coffin of Narses was robbed of a vast 
quantity of treasure by the Emperor Tiberius. One 
might almost think, from the number of royal pil- 
ferers, that these deposits were made with a view to 
regal necessities. 

Alexander the Great was buried by his successor, 
Ptolemy, in a coffin of gold, but was found by Au- 
gustus in one of glasa By whom the exchange was 
made, the robbery committed, does not appear. The 
Emperor Augustus caused the body to be brought out 
of the vault that he might survey it.^ 



^ In repairing a road in Northamptonshire, a beautiful glass 
coffin was found, containing the remains of a child. Antiquarians 
referred its construction to the reign of Henry YL 




EXHUMATION. 347 

* He that lay in a golden urn, eminently above the 
earth, was not like to find the quiet of his bones/ 
Many a cinerary urn has been stolen for the sake of 
the gold or jewellery enclosed with the ashes ; and 
many a Tartar tomb has been ravaged for the shroud 
of thin plated gold in which their kings and nobles 
were enfolded. 

We are told by ecclesiastical writers that in the 
early times of Christianity, when the custom had 
gained of burying the rich in costly and sump- 
tuous attire, it was very usual to tear and disfigure 
these garments before the tomb was finally closed, 
in order that the temptation to spoliation might be 
lessened. 

As due and fitting reverence to the memory of 
Saints and holy men degenerated in its nature, it be- 
came customary to make offerings — often most su- 
perb and costly ones— to the shrines of those most in 
esteem. Here were new incentives to cupidity. 

About the middle of the last century there were 
many persons in Siberia who still subsisted entirely 
on the spoils they had obtained somewhat earlier 
(after the retirement fr6m the country of the infest- 
ing Kalmucs) by ransacking the sepulchres found 
on the rivers Irtish, Tobol, Ob, and Yenisei But 
since that time it is not certainly known that any 
have followed this occupation. The custom was to 



34* god's acrr 

associate in large companies for searching after se- 
pulchres, in the same manner as they do in our times 
for hunting sables. 

In apostatized France, during the Revolution, this 
work of desecration proceeded at fearful speed. 
Neither rank, nor sex, nor fame, was regarded ; the 
dead of all sorts were rudely thrust from their tombs, 
that the lead of which the coffins were composed 
might be melted into bullets for internecine war. 
No heathen nation since the beginning of time ever 
equalled this ^polished nation' in their then die- 
humanized career. 

For even when from necessity, or to say the least, 
from what may be called sufficient motive. Exhuma- 
tion is allowed, it is a very solemn and serious thing. 
I well remember the subdued tones, the sort of awe 
with which, when I was young, a circumstance of the 
kind was referred to in our own family, though the 
removal was only that of a very young child to its 
mother's later-made grave. When Malibran died, 
and was interred in Manchester Old Church, the 
whole town (it was not a city then) was astir, because 
her remains were exhumed^ at the imperious in- 
stance of him who was understood not to have been 
over careful of her in life. 

^ Of course not without the licence of the proper authorities. 



EXHUMATION. 349 

But a far deeper interest attached to an occur- 
rence of the kind, known to me, of a strictly 
private character, which took place a few years later. 

A clergyman, in the very prime of life, died from an 
illness imbibed by watching too sedulously over his 
two infant children, sick of fever. He was buried in 
the churchyard of his own church ; but very few 
weeks had elapsed ere it was found that the site of 
the grave had been most inauspiciously selected — the 
churchyard was liable to be flooded, and he was in- 
terred in the very pathway of the frequent floods. 
At deep midnight, a stormy and tempestuous night, 
the rain falling in torrents, and the wind roaring amid 
the trees of the secluded country churchyard, by the 
reopened grave stood his young and delicate widow. 
Pale as a statue, but, to all outward appearance, firm 
as one, she stood during the whole procedure ; nor 
moved, nor would move, until her early-lost husband 
was deeply buried in a more enduring soil in another 
quarter of the ohurchyard. 

On the Continent, in early Christian times, the 
Emperor, or the Governor of the Province, had to be 
appealed to ere a corpse could be removed from the 
place of its interment ; and in all times there have 
been rigid restrictions to uphold that fear of desecra-^ 
tion which is not only peremptory to Christianity, but 
is natural to humanity, however frequent circumstances 



350 god's acre. 

may seem to show the contrary. The instances on 
record of exhumation are hardly as a drop in the 
ocean compared to the multitude of the dead ; and 
many of these have been caused involuntarily by the 
turning of roads, or repairing or remodelling of 
churches ; and not a few perhaps by the operations 
of nature. 

Of the latter an instance is given by the Kev. C C. 
Southey, in describing a tour made with his father iu 
1836. He says that in the ancient British Church of 
Feranzabuloe (or Saint Peran in the Sands), in Corn- 
wall, now again half-buried in sand, the shifting of 
the sand in a recent storm had exposed to view a row 
of stone coffins without covers, with the skeletons in 
them nearly perfect. He adds that the sand all 
around was filled with small fragments of human 
bones, indicating a burial-place at some distant pe> 
riod, of considerable extent 

In the year 1508 the tomb of St Dunstan, who 
had been buried 520 years, was secretly opened by- 
order of the Archbishop and Prior of Canterbury. 
Fains had been taken on the interment of the Saint 
to prevent the desecration of his remains, but cu- 
riosity is often stimulated by difficulties. Withia 
the stonework shrine was an immense wooden 
chest, extracted from it with much difficulty, and 



KXHXTMATION. 35 1 

within this were two leaden coffins, one of pecu- 
liar and very elaborate construction, to be opened 
before the end of the spoilers was attained. From 
the mouldering remains of the holy man they took 
part of his crown, which they lodged amongst their 
relics: and indeed this was the cause of much of 
the spoliation of tombs, even from the very earliest 
ages of Christianity. The graves of the early martyrs 
were often despoiled when the mistaken veneration 
for relics became prevalent ; and this mistaken re- 
verence led scores of irreverent spoilers to the tombs, 
who found in relics a source of profitable traffic. It 
would puzzle Uhe calculating boy' himself to sum 
up the number of * pieces of the true Cross' that 
have been dispersed over the world ; whilst the 
Saints in high estimation must have possessed teeth, 
nails, and finger-joints innumerable. The traffic was 
immense and the imposition shameless. 

St. Dunstan has, whether truly or not, the cha- 
racter of having been sufficiently pugnacious during 
his lifetime, but a venerable lady, if chroniclers be 
true, carried this characteristic into the tomb. We 
are gravely told that the Danes having broken a 
hole in the coffin of Etheldrida, foundress of Ely 
Monastery, a priest endeavoured to draw out some 
of the drapery. The Saint snatched it back so hastily 
that she tripped him over, and he never recovered his 



^^2, god's acre, 

senses after the fall. The hole in the coffin was 
repaired by order of Bishop Athelwold. 

The tomb of Edward I. was opened, and an accu- 
rate description of the royal vestments and of the 
inner coverings of fine cerecloth were noted down 
for the behoof of the inquisitive in such matters : one 
reason being that the royal warrants so repeatedly 
issued by King Edward III. and his successors, ' De 
cera renovenda circa corpus regis Edwardi primi' (com- 
bined with the fact that while he willed his heart to 
the Holy Land, he commanded that his body should 
be carried along with the army into Scotland), gave 
rise to the opinion that more than ordinary care 
bad been taken over the embalmment. The tomb was 
opened in 1774 in presence of the Dean of West- 
minster and two Prebendaries. The body was found 
in a state of complete preservation, having on two 
robes, one of gold and silver tissue, the other of 
crimson velvet, a sceptre in each hand, a crown on 
his head, and many jewels still bright 

In the Ocntleman'a Magazine for May, 1834, is 
an account of the private opening of the tomb of 
King Henry IV., who died in the Jerusalem Cham- 
ber, Westminster, and was buried at Canterbury. 
His countenance was unchanged except in colour, 
but after a few minutes' exposure to the air collapsed. 

The coffin of Thomas Grey, Marquis of Dorset, 



KXHUMATION, 353 

who was buried in the Chancel at Astley, in Warwick- 
shire, was opened about the year 1607. Though he 
had been then interred above a hundred years, his 
corpse, in colour, proportion, and softness, was like 
one newly interred. But the same is said of the 
body of William the Conqueror, after an inhuma- 
tion of above four hundred years, on the opening of 
his tomb at Caen in 1522. 

A strange zeal for this gloomy kind of knowledge, 
more honoured, we think, in the breach than the 
observance, was exhibited at Danbury Church, 
Essex^ in the year 1779. In a sheU, enclosed in an 
elm coffin, and that again in a leaden one, under a 
massy stone — substantial barriers, one would have 
thought, against spoliation — was a body in good 
preservation, in a pickle which had somewhat the 
appearance of mushroom-catsup. One of the dis- 
coverers, writing to the Gentleman* 8 Magazine, says, 
' As I never possessed the sense of smelling, and was 
willing to ascertain the flavour of the liquor, I tasted 
it' (!) De gustihua, say we. The adventurous expe- 
rimentalist found it * aromatic, though not very pun- 
gent, partaking of the taste of catsup and of the 
pickle of Spanish olives.' Here indeed the zeal for 
scientific analysis might perchance form some extenua^ 
tion, but it must have been the excess of depraved 
curiosity which, when the coffin of *Good Duke_ 

A A 



354 QOD*S ACRK 

Humphrey' was opened, caased the multitude to 
press forward and taste the liquor in which the 
body was preserved, until the corpse was left bare 
and dry, and of course soon mouldered away. 

More flagrantly loathsome is the circumstance 
recorded of a Mr. Thompson, of Worcester, who 
baited his angling-hook with part of the corrupted 
form of King John, and carried the fish he caught in 
vulgar and brutal triumph through the streets. The 
moment this enormity reached the ears of the Dean 
and Chapter, they took measures to have the tomb 
reclosed, which had been opened in repairing the 
Cathedral in 1797. But ere this care was taken, a 
person had stolen a finger-bone, and sent it up to 
London to be tipped with silver, having refused a 
large sum for it. It is some pleasure to read that it 
was dropped on the road and lost. 

So during the reign of the National Convention in 
Prance, when the decree was executed ordering that 
the graves and monuments of the Kings in St. Denis, 
and indeed throughout France, should be destroyed — 
the noted Camille Desmoulins made a prize of one of 
the little fingers of Marshal Turenne. The indignities 
ofifered to the corpse of their whilom idol, Henry IV., 
are scarcely credible — ^women assisting — ^till it seemed 
a happy issue that the dishonoured remains were 
flung into the common pit prepared for the dead. 



EXHUMATION, 355 

The spoliation described above seems to have 
been a work of mere curiosity ; but bones, hair, nails, 
and teeth of the dead were at one period in great 
request, being the stock-in-trade and treasures of 
conjurors and sorcerers.^ 

It is said by Stow that at the suppression of Fever- 
sham Abbey, in Kent, the remains of King Stephen 
were cast into the river for the sake of the lead 
wherein they were enclosed. 

The coflSn of King Charles L was opened on the 
first of April, 1813, in presence of the Prince Regent. 
Sir Henry Halford has published an account of this 
procedure, together with a sketch of the head of the 
ill-fated monarch. 

The skull of Pope was disturbed accidentally a few 
years ago, upon digging a grave in Twickenham 
Churchyard, but was at once reverently replaced.^ 



^ Here have I a pilot's thumb, 
Wreck'd, as homeward he did come. 

Mdchethj Act i. 
Finger of birth-strangled babe. — Act iv. 
^ In the year 1562 the Calviuists broke open the tomb of 
Matilda, Queen of the Conqueror, and stole the ring off her 
finger. Edward the Confessor's body was exposed in James II. 's 
reign; King Canute's in 1766, in repairing Winchester Cathe* 
dral ; Sebert's, King of the East Angles, in Henry III.'s reign $ 
King Bufus in Charles II.'s reign. 

The remains of the Saxon Kings, in boxes, in the side screens 

A A ^ 



356 god's acrk 

The early Christian fashion of robing the dead 
merely in white linen, soon gave way, as we have 
named, to costly and gorgeous sepulchral robes, and 
these continued to be used according to the rank, 
style, and fortune of the deceased even when the 
strange processes of embalming or * salting' necessi- 
tated the folding of the corpse in the strongest cere- 
cloths. Indeed, from about the time of the Conquest, 
and upwards of a century after, the usual folding 
for a corpse seems to have been the strongest leather 
or a bull s hide, while the whole art of embalming, 
or at least the whole practice of it, consisted in 
cutting large gashes in the body and throwing in salt^ 



of the Choir of Winchester Cathedral, not many years since 
were allowed to be examined by Edmund Cartwright, Esq., of 
the York Militia ; to whom, with two other gentlemen of the 
regiment, the then Dean of Winchester gave permission to open 
any tombs in the Cathedral, provided it was done with privacy 
and decency, and under the direction of the mason of the Chapter. 

The remains of Edward lY. and Elizabeth Woodville, his 
wife ; of Katherine, wife of Edward Y. ; of Queen Katherine 
Parr, at Sudeley, under circumstances most revolting and shock- 
ing ; and of King Charles I. within the last few years — have all 
been disturbed in their graves. — Quarterly Review. 

' Almost every imaginable ingredient has been at one time or 
other used in embalmment, from the myrrh, aloes, and precious 
spices recorded in Scripture as used by the Hebrews, to the 
rough application of common salt referred to in the text. The 
Lacedsemonians and Babylonians made use of honey. Alexander 




EXHUMATION. 357 

Of the fashion of the ox-hide we have a great many 
instances. The first we have found recorded is Hugh 
de Grentesmil, who died in 1094. Henry L and his 
son Prince Henry, the Empress Maude, King John, 
a Countess of Pembroke, James III. of Scotland, and 
others are recorded by Gough as wrapped in bulls' 
hides. The celebrated Hugh Lupus, who died in i loi, 
was buried in leather gilded, and his ankles were tied 
together with a string.^ His grave (a stone coffin in 

the Great was embalmed in honey. The Ethiopians had plaster, 
which they coloured to the resemblance of the deceased: the 
Persians and Scythians, wax. In England a sort of pickle was at 
one time in vogne, and bodies have been disinterred in good pre- 
servation ; but this has been owing probably quite as much to 
the glass air-tight coffin as to the pickle. 

Wax was, in very early times, a favourite material for pre- 
serving bodies from putrefaction. In later times it has been 
not unfrequently used, but in a manner different from that 
anciently practised, being not a single ingredient, but only a 
principal one amongst others. 

Elizabeth Tudor, second daughter of Henry YII., was cered 
hy the wiiX'chandler, 

Embrocations of cocoa-nut oil have been used in the South 
Sea Islands : by Peruvians and others, exposing for some time in 
the snow, and then applying a bituminous substance. In the 
infancy of Chemistry there was certainly an idea entertained tha 
scientific application could preserve the resemblance of real life 
in the dead. 

^ An officer of the Abbey of St. Alban's, who was deranged by 
hard study, it is said, was interred at Binham, in Norfolk, in 
the fetters with which he had been manacled in his lifetime. 



358 GOD'S ACRE. 

Chester Chapter-house) was disturbed in 1724. To 
the bull's-hide King John desired might be added a 
monk's cowl ; and he especially directed that he 
should be buried close to the grave of Saint Wulstan, 
a Saxon bishop of great reputed sanctity. It waa 
believed by the credulous of those days that evil 
spirits dared not even approach the grave of a holy 
man. King John evidently participated in this 
belief.1 

But the most revolting part of the usages of those 
times is the dismemberment of the body. It is doubt- 
less requisite in embalmment that portions should be 
removed. In old times when embalmment was resorted 
to, the bowels were immediately and eflfectually burnt 
to cinder. But this decent and healthful observance 
was not attended to in our own country. Hearts and 
bowels were frequently, if not generally, lodged 
separately from their bodies, and the custom, which 
Captain Cook tells us prevailed among the barbarians 
of Otaheite, of cuttiug up the body of a chief before 
the altar and burying it in three different places, 



' The desire to be interred toitkin monasteries was throughout 
the middle ages ahnost universal. 

Louis le Gros used often to explain his motive for wishing to 
be buried in the Abbey of St. Denis amidst the Saints thus : — 

' It was/ he said, ' in order that by the prayers of the pilgiims 
and others passing, he might obtain pardon of his sins.' 



EXHUMATION. 359 

seems to have been surpassed in our own Christianized 
country. 

The bowels, tongue, heart, eyes, and brains of 
Henry I. were buried together, separate from his body, 
in the Church of St Mary de Pr^, at Rouen. 

The body of Richard I. was buried at Fontevraud ; 
his heart at Roan, and his bowels at Chaluz. 

Stephen Longesp^e's heart was buried at Braden* 
stoke, but his body at Lacock : the heart of his brother 
Nicholas, Bishop of Sarum, at Lacock, his bowels at 
Ramsbury, and his body at Sarum. 

King Robert Bruce bequeathed his heart to Jeru- 
salem. It is said that the Lord James of Douglas 
wept bitterly when he received this commission from 
the lips of the dying hero. 

Douglas wore it (this heart) round his neck, enclosed 
in a silver case. In battle with the Moors in Spain, 
whither he tarried on his way to the Holy Land, 
seeing the day lost, he flung the silver case forward, 
exclaiming, ' Pass first in fight as thou wert wont to 
do, and Douglas will follow thee, or die.' And in- 
deed after the battle his body was found lying above 
the silver case, as if it had been his last object to 
defend the Bruce's heart 

From that time the Douglases have carried upon 
their shields a bloody heart with a crown on it ; and 
Sir Simon Lockhard (who, with the few remaining 



360 god's acre. 

Scottish knights who survived this unhappy melee^ 
did not pursue their journey to Palestine but returned 
to Scotland) had his name changed to Lockheart (now 
Lockhart), in testimony of his charge of this deposit 
home. The heart was ultimately interred below the 
high altar in Melrose Abbey. 

The same mistaken but earnest feeling of piety 
caused the fiat of Edward I. that his heart should be 
carried to the Holy Land. 

A hundred and forty knights were appointed to 
take charge of it, and thirty-two thousand pounds of 
silver were granted for their maintenance whilst thus 
employed. 

The heart of Eleanor, his Queen, was deposited, at 
her own desire, in the Church of the Friars Predi- 
cants, in London. Several skilful persons, painters 
and decorators, were employed to embellish the place 
where it lay ; and there is an entry in their accounts 
of 77s. 6d. for one hundred and twenty pounds of 
wax to make torches Ho burn about the Queen's 
heart on the day of her anniversary.' 

Isabel, wife of Richard, Earl of Cornwall, in the 
thirteenth century, was buried at Beaulieu, but her 
heart was placed in a silver cup at Tewkesbury, and 
her bowels at Missenden Abbey. 

This horrid custom, of which we might cite many 
more instances, is said to have obtained so universally 



tm^mm I ^j I ^n^— ^■■^■^■(^■^ 



EXHtJMATION* 361 

abroad, that ' the walls of the principal conventual 
churches in France are covered with sumptuous 
memorials of the several hearts sent from diflferent 
countries and deposited under them/ 

The writer o{ Family Romance has lately published 
a graphic account of the wanderings in both hemi- 
spheres of the heart of the celebrated Marquis of Mon- 
trose, which was obtained after his execution by Lady 
Napier, the wife of his nephew. After being embalmed, 
it was put in a small steel case, made of the blade of 
Montrose^s sword, and that case was enclosed in a gold 
filigree box, a gift of the Doge of Venice to John 
Napier, the inventor of logarithms. Having been lost 
sight of for some time, it was recognised by a friend 
of Lord Napier in the collection of a Dutch virtuoso 
and obtained from him. Lord Napier's daughter, 
Mrs. Johnstone, carried it to India. The vessel in 
which she sailed was attacked by a French squadron ; 
she was wounded, and the filigree box, which she had 
on her arm, was shattered, but the steel case remained 
uninjured. From the care taken of it, it was supposed 
to be a talisman, and under this supposition it was 
stolen, and offered to and purchased by a native 
prince at a very high price ; and he, a considerable 
time afterwards^ learning the circumstances, restored, 
it to the lady's son. It was lost during the French 
Revolution* 



362 god's acre. 

Lord Edward Bruce, elder brother of the first Earl 
of Elgin, was killed in a duel in Holland by Sir 
Edward Sackville, in 1613, and was interred at 
Bergen. In consequence of a tradition that his 
heart had been sent for interment to the old Abbey- 
Church of Culross, in Perthshire, search was made in 
1808, and it was found in a silver case of foreign 
workmanship, with his name engraven on it, and 
this case was curiously concealed in a hollow, 
scooped within two flat stones, these stones being 
strongly clasped with iron. 

We are told by the writer of Sepulchral Monu- 
Tmnta that he had seen in the hall-window at 
Cashiobury a marble case, enclosing the heart of 
Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex, who was found mur- 
dered in the Tower in 1683. 

His father, Arthur, Lord Capel, beheaded in 1643, 
desired, in an access of loyalty, that his heart should 
be preserved at Hadham until his royal master should 
receive kingly funeral honours — a circumstance 
he thought sure to accrue on the restoration of 
the royal line — and then that it should be laid at his 
master's feet In the year 1703, when the family 
removed from Hadham Hall to settle at Cashiobury, 
Dean Stanley, Rector of Hadham, and a cherished 
friend of the family, found in a press in the Charter- 
room, where he was attending to the muniments. 




EXHUMATION. 363 

a silver cup and cover closely locked up, with a 
written account that it contained the heart of Arthur, 
Lord Capel, whose body had been buried in the 
Chancel of the Church of Little Hadham, under a 
large black marble stone, whereon are engraven, in 
very deep characters, the following words — * Who 
was murdered for his loyalty to Charles 1/ 

The heart thus found was deposited in the family 
vault at Little Hadham ; but, at the suggestion of 
the Dean, for fear of robbery, an iron box was sub- 
stituted for the silver one, which was sold, and the 
money bestowed on the poor. 

A similar instance of devoted attachment is re* 
corded of Sir Nicholas Crispe, knight and baronet, 
who, as the inscription on his monument records, 
was ' a loyal sharer in the sufferings of his late and 
present Majesty' — for whom indeed he exhibited 
untiring zeal and devotion. 

He erected a monument of black and white marble 
in Hammersmith Church soon after the Restoration, 
upon which he placed a bust of the Martyr King, 
underneath which is a small urn. 

* Lay my body,' he said to his grandson when on 
his death-bed — * Lay my body as I have directed in 
the family vault in the parish church of St Mildred, 
in Bread-street, but let my heart be placed in an 
urn at my master's feet' 



«•• * 



3^4 god's acre 

Sir William Temple's heart was, by his own desire, 
buried in a silver box, under the dial in his garden, 
at More Park, Surrey. 

There is a singular circumstance recorded with 
regard to Shelley, the poet, whose remains were 
burnt on the sea-shore, salt and frankincense being 
freely used, which gave to the flame a singular 
appearance. His heart, it is said, would not take the 
flame, and therefore it was preserved in spirits of wine. 

After the death of Napoleon, the gentlemen of 
his suite were very anxious that his heart should be 
preserved and given to them, but Sir Hudson Lowe 
did not feel himself authorized to grant this request. 
He agreed, however, that the heart should be placed 
in a silver vase, filled with spirits, so that, if per- 
mission were given, this could be disinhumed and 
sent to Europe. But, as my readers are aware, the 
corpse of this celebrated man was exhumed a few- 
years ago, and re-interred with great honour in 
France. Before removing the remains from St. 
Helena, the lids of the coffins were raised with the 
utmost care, and the features of Napoleon revealed 
for about two minutes. They were little changed. 

A very revolting exemplification of filial affection, 
though so highly lauded for its piety, has always seemed 
to me that act of Margaret Roper — the preserving 
her venerable father's head in the chamber in which 
she was accustomed to sit For surely the most 



EXHUMATION. 365 

reverential duty we can testify to the mortal re- 
mains of those honoured and beloved is to consign 
them to the holy quiet of the grave. 

Sir Thomas More s head was ultimately buried 
in the tomb of the Ropers — ^tradition says, in the 
arras of Mrs. Roper ; but in the year 1 740, when it 
was last seen, on the final closing of the vault, it was 
placed in a niche in the wall, with a grating before 
it, because the lower jaw had been stolen} 

Tradition says also that the youngest son of Sir 
Walter Raleigh, Carew, preserved his father's head 
to be buried with him. The story is so far credible, 
that a skull was found close by his coffin, at West 
Horsely, Surrey. 

How lightly in those days must have been esteemed, 
or how grossly must have been misunderstood, that 
doctrine of the resurrection of the body which teaches 
us to have decent and reverent care of it, for that IT 
shall rise again. 

Dust to dust — 
It is s'*attered by the winds, it is wafted by the waves, it 

mixeth with herbs and cattle, 
But God hath watched those morsels, and hath guided them 

in care : 
Each waiting soul must claim his own, when the archangel 

souudeth. 



* When the grave of Burns was opened for the interment of 
his wife, the opportunity was seized by some persons to abstract 
the poet's skull, in order to take a cast from it. 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE PASSING BELL. 

Tintadgel bells ring o'er the tide ! 
• • * * 

' Come to thy (jod in time V 
Thus saith their pealing chime ; 
' Youth, manhood, old age past, 
Come to thy God at last !* 

For hark ! still, still 
The bell doth towle 
For some but now- 
Departing sowle. 

' rpHE sound of the church-going bell' is so fami- 
liar to our ears that it is difficult for us to 
realize in our thoughts the time when a Christian 
congregation was called together by the noise of a 
wooden rattle, as we are told was originally the case 
in England. Jewish worshippers were summoned 
to the service of the Tabernacle by the blast of 
trumpets, and this magnificent instrument was also 
used for convoking Christian congregations, both in 
Egypt and Palestine. 

The trumpet was used in the Monastery of Mount 
Sinai in the sixth century, but in other monasteries 



THE PASSING BELL. 367 

the call was given by a wooden mallet, which each 
recluse in turn struck on the cell of his brethren. 
But the musical vocal summons of the Muezzins to 
prayer, so often referred to by travellers, had a still 
more beautiful precedent ; for we are told, that in the 
Convent at Jerusalem, founded by the Lady Paula, 
the usual summons to worship was a chaunted Hal- 
lelujah. 

Small bells have ever been in use for a variety of 
purposes. The High Priest of the Jews had them 
attached to his robe ; as also had Hebrew virgins 
and boys. They were appendages to the royal 
costumes of the ancient Persian kings, who united in 
their own persons both the royal and sacerdotal oflSce. 
Grecian military leaders concealed them within the 
hollow of their shields, and in later times the chief 
men and civil officers among the Germans fixed them 
to their belts and to the skirts of their garments. 

The auguries of the Priestess of Dodona were 
assisted in their announcement by bells : a bell was 
used in the Grecian fish-markets ; the Roman Tepi- 
dgfcrium was announced to its luxurious votaries by 
the sound of a bell ; it is said that bells were among 
the ensigns of an executioner; and in the middle 
ages they were used for military signals. 

It has been supposed, reasonably enough, that bells 
were of late introduction as invitatory to Christian 



368 god's ACER 

worship, because during times of persecution this loud 
signal would have betrayed the worshippers to their 
enemiea 

The first notice we have of large church bells is 
that they were invented at Nola, a town of Campania, 
by Paulinus, the Bishop of that See, about the year 
A.D. 4(X)» Others attribute the introduction of church 
bells to Pope Sabinianus, A.D. 604. They were pro- 
bably brought into England very soon after their 
invention. They are spoken of by Bede towards the 
close of the seventh century; in the eighth it was 
decreed, in the Excerptions of St. Egbert (a.d. 750), 
' that all priests, at appointed hours of day and night, 
do sound the bells of their churches, and then cele- 
brate the sacred oflSce to God, and instruct the people/ 
In the tenth century. Saint Dunstan hung a great 
many in our churches. 

Bells were sonorously tolled at both the opening 
and close of the Roman OBSce of Excommunication, 
and at the solemn cursing by ' bell, book, and candle/ 
which was denounced against sinners every three 
months* This ' Oeneral great Cursey found at Ca/n- 
terbury, A.D. 1562, as it is set down by Thomas 
Becon, in the Reliques of RoTtie,' concludes thus : — 
* That they be accursed of God and of the Chirch, 
froe the sole of her foot to the crown of h^r hede, 
fileaping and waking, sitting and standing, and in all 



THE PASSING BELL. 369 

her Words, and in all her Werks ; but if they have 
noe Grace of God to amend hem here in this Lyfe, 
for to dwell in 'the pain of Hell for ever withouten 
End : Fiat : Fiat. Doe to the Boke, Quench the 
Candles : Eing the Bell : Amen, Amen/ 

^ And then the Book is clapp'd together, the Candles 
blown out, and the Bells rung, with a most dreadful 
noise made by the Congregation present, bewailing 
the accursed persons concerned in that Black Doom 
denounced against them.' 

From the custom of consecrating by prayer any im- 
plement appropriated to God, certain ceremonies were 
enacted over church bells, which are commonly called 
* Baptizing the Bells,' and which some consider to be 
really this sacred rite. Others say the bell indeed 
' was washed and anointed ; was blessed and solemnly 
dedicated and set apart to God, but not baptized/ 
Per contra, says a recent writer, a clergyman, * The 
most extraordinary feature, however, in the career of 
bells has undoubtedly been their undergoing the 
whole exterior process of Christian baptism — ^including 
naming, anointing, sprinkling, robing, sponsorial en- 
gagements, and every initiative accompaniment which 
marks the admission of rational beings into the 
Gospel Covenant.' And indeed there seems to be 
no doubt that the ceremony of the consecration or 
baptism of bells was at one period rendered far more 

BB 



370 GODS ACBE. 

imposing and gnmd than this holy office bestowed 
on ' God's image/ our human selves. In the year 
^D. 789 there is an order from Charlemagne pro- 
hibiting the baptism of bells^ but this interdiction did 
not last long. 

Not that bells, say the advocates of the system^ are 
baptized for the remission of sins ; but that they may 
receive power to ' act as preservatives against thunder 
and lightning, and hail and wind, and storms of 
every kind, and that they may drive away evil 
spirits.' 

Mr. Digby, in the Mores Catholici, writes with his 
usual enthusiasm on this subject : — 

The great German poet's Song of the Bell, he 
says, in point of subUme and impressive imagery, ' does 
not surpass the language of the Church respect- 
ing it, when in the OflSce of its Consecration the 
bishop prays that as the voice of Christ appeased the 
troubled sea, God would be pleased to endue that 
sound with such virtue, that it may intimidate the 
enemy and encourage the faithful people ; and that 
as the Holy Ghost formerly descended upon David 
when he struck the chords of his harp, and the 
thunder of the air repelled adversaries when Samuel 
offered up the lamb, in like manner at the sound of 
that vase passing through the clouds, flights of angels 
may surround the assembly of the church, and save 



THE PASSING BELL. 371 

the minds and bodies of the believers with an ever- 
lasting protection.' 

The superstitious reverence with which church 
bells were once regarded, attached itself to every 
circumstance connected with them ; and as it was 
deemed highly sacrilegious to remove them, so was it 
supposed that Divine vengeance speedily followed on 
the attempt. ' When I was a child,' says Sir Thomas 
Spelman, * I heard much talk of the pulling down of 
bells in every part of my country of Norfolk, then 
fresh in memory, and the sum of the speech usually 
was, that in sending them over sea, some were drowned 
in one haven, some in another, as at Lynn, Wells, or 
Yarmouth.' 

This has really been the case in many instances. 

The bells in Edinburgh were pulled. down and 
shipped to be carried into the Low Countries, but 
they were all drowned in Leigh haven. 

Sir Hugh Paulett pulled down the bells of the 
churches of Jersey, and sending them to St. Halo's, 
fourteen of them were drowned at the entrance of 
that harbour. And originating in this circumstance 
is the adage yet prevalent in those parts when a 
strong east wind blows — * The bells of Jersey now 
ring.' 

Sir Thomas Spelman records that on occasion of 
a certain ebb-tide at Hunstanton, ^ Such a neap. as 

BB 2 



37 !i god's acbe. 

never before seen/ the oyster dredgers going out much 
farther than usual, found a large bell with the mouth 
upward, sunk to the brim. The lord of the manor 
wished to have it raised, but the sea never again 
receded far enough for the attempt to be made. 

My motto, taken from a most charming little book,^ 
refers to an incident of this nature. Forrabury 
Church, in Cornwall, had no bells, whilst the in- 
habitants of Tintadgel, close by, heard, we are told, 
the famous peal that had rung for King Arthur's 
funeral. A magnificent peal of bells was ordered for 
Forrabury, and as the ship containing them neared the 
harbour, the sound of Tintadgel bells came faintly 
stealing over the waters as they rang the vesper chime. 
The pilot, a religious man, thanked Qod aloud for 
their safe voyage, and thereby excited the anger and 
impious jests of the captain and crew. You will 
anticipate the result. The ship went down close to 
shore, and the bells were heard tolling as they sank 
with the vessel. The pilot alone was rescued. 

Perhaps a few stanzas from the poem I have re» 
ferred to may please some of my readers ; — 

The Pilot heard his native bells 

Hang on the breeze in fitful swells ; 

' Thank God !* with reverent brow, he cried, 

* We make the shore with evening's tide.' 



* Echoes from Old Cornwall, By the Rev. R. S. Haweeb, 
M. A., Vicar of Morwenstow. 



k^ 



THE PASSING BELL. 373 

' Come to thy Gk)D in time !' 
It was his marriage chime ; 
' Yoath, manhood, old age past !' 
His bell must ring at last. 

' Thank God ! thou whining knave, on land—' 
But thank, at sea, the Steersman's hand,— 
The Captain's voice above the gale, — 
Thank the good ship and ready sail !' 

' Come to thy God in time !' 

Sad grew the boding chime; 

' Come to thy God at last !' 

Boom'd heavy on the blast. 

Uprose that sea as if it heard 
The Mighty Master's signal word ! 
What tlirills the Captain's whitening lip P 
The death groans of his sinking ship ! 

' Come to thy God in time !' 

Swung deep the funeral-chime ; 

' Grace, mercy, kindness past. 

Come to thy God at last I* 

Long did the rescued Pilot tell, 
When gray hairs o'er his forehead fell. 
While those around would hear and weep, 
That fearful judgment of the deep! 

Still when the storm of Bottreau's waves 
Is waking in his weedy caves, 
Those bells, that sullen surges hide, 
JPeal their deep tones beneath the tide} 

' Come to thy God in time !' 

Thus saith the ocean-chime ; 

* Storm, billow, whirlwind past. 

Come to thy God at last 1' 

* Such is the belief of the people there. 



374 god's acre. 

It was at one time a received opinion of the 
ignorant, that baptized bells possessed power against 
evil spirits, and also against storm and tempest. As 
these old rhymes declare — 

If that the thauder chaunce to rove, 

And stormie tempest shake, 
A wonder is it for to see 

The wretches howe they quake — 
Howe that no fayth at all they have, 

Nor trust in anything — 
The clarke doth all the helles forthwith 

At once in steeple ring : 
With wondrous sound and deeper farre 

Than he was woont before, 
Till in the lofbie heavens darke 

The thunder bray no more : 
For in these christened belles, they thinke, 

Doth lie such powre and might 
As able is the tempest great 

And storme to vanquish quight. 

In the accounts of the Churchwardens of Sandwich 
for the year 1464 there is a charge for bread and 
drink for ' ryngers in the gret Thunderyng/ 

Anciently, priests themselves used to toll the beU 
in cathedrals and great churches, and were thence 
called CampanariL It is said that there was once a 
bell at Canterbury which required thirty-two men to 
toll it (ad sonandum), and another twenty-four. 
It required the force of sixteen men to sound the 



k 



THE PASSING BELL. 375 

Great Bell of Strasbourg, which measured twenty-two 
feet in circumference. In Italy there were bells the 
sound of which has split the thickest walls and over- 
thrown huge towers.^ 

Their general adaptation to, and common use on 
every important circumstance of life, is well told in 
the ancient distich — 

Laudo Deam verum, plebem vooo, congrego clerum, 
Defimctos ploro, pestem fugo, festa decoro. 

Or as a friend reads it — 

'Tis mine to call the people here, 
And clergy too, to praise the Lord : 

To mourn the dead, repel disease, 
And hail with joy the festive board. 

To the same purport — 

To bring the folks in church to time, 

I chime ; 

When mirth and pleasure's on the wing, 

I ring; 

When from the body parts the soul, 

I toll. 



^ But no bell ever cast is to be compared to the ' Great Bell of 
Moscow/ the weight of which was upwards of four hundred and 
thirty thousand pounds. It was fractured by accident; water, 
to extinguish a fire in the environing building, having been 
thrown on when it was hot, and it still remains in the pit where 
it was cast. 



376 god's acre. 

There is another old rhyme — 

Funera plango, 
Fulgora irango, 
Sabbata pango. 
Excito lentos, 
Dissipo ventos, 
Paco cnientos. 

There were generally various solemn lines inscribed 
on the bell. Thus, on one bell of the Cathedral of 
Strasbourg — 

Nuncio festa^ xnetum, nova qnsedam, flebile lethum. 
On another — 

Eex Glorke Christen veni cum pace. 
On another — 

Vox ego sum vite, voco vos ; orate, venits. 

One of the bells at Rylstone Church, which seems 
coeval with the building of the tower, has a motto 
which Wordsworth refers to in his poem, the White 
Doe of Rylstone — 

When the bells of Rylstone played 
Their Sabbath music, dSiOtf u» agtie. 

There were often also the churchwardens' names 
inscribed on bells, as well as the name of the 
maker. 



THE PASSING BELL. 377 

But I have wandered all too widely from the 
chief subject of this chapter. 

Coeval with the introduction of church bells has 
been the appropriation of one of them to the solemn 
Service of the dying. The piety of our ancestors 
caused this bell to be tolled when a person was 
yielding up life (hence called the Passing Bell), in 
order that all who heard it might offer up a prayer 
for the departing spirit. 

^ Our Church/ observes Wheatley, ' in imitation of 
the Saints in former ages, calls on the minister and 
others who are at hand to assist their brother in his 
last extremity. In order to this, she directs that 
when any one is passing out of this life a bell should 
be tolled/ 

At the very crisis we may suppose when the minister 
of the Gospel is consigning his dying brother to his 
Maker's mercy in the Commendatory Prayer appointed 
by the Church, in conformity with the 67th Canon, 
which says, 'Whenever any is passing out of this 
life, a bell shall be tolled, and the Minister shall 
not then slack to do his last duty/ 

And in the seventh year of Queen Elizabeth it was 
ordered — 

* Item, that when anye Christian Bodie is in pass- 
ing, that the Bell be tolled, and that the Curate be 
speciallie called for to comforte the sicke person ; and 



378 god's acre. 

after the time of his paasmge, to ringe no more but 
one shorte peale ; and one before the Buriall^ and 
another shorte peale after the BuriaD/ 

The ' one shorte peale' after the ^ time of his pass- 
inge/ is the ringing out referred to by Fuller below. 

For a long time this bell was rung at the moment 
of dying, and there can be no question as to its bene- 
ficial efiect on the individual who, in charity, and 
benevolence, and piety, offered prayer. 

When thou dost hear a Toll or Knell, 
Then think upon thy Passing Bell. 

The Venerable Bede speaks of this bell as common 
in his time, and relates how the death of the Abbess 
Hilda is made known the same night to a nun in 
a monastery at a great distance — doubtless by the 
sound of the Passing BelL 

We learn from Durand that towards the end of 
the twelfth century the custom was in full use, m 
order ' that people may put up their prayers' for the 
dying. Dr. Donne says — 

As prayers ascend 
To Heaven in troops at a good man's Passing Bell. 

Indeed, up to the time of Charles II. the tolling 
of the Passing Bell formed one of the inquiries in all 
Articles of Visitation. 

It was, however, held popish and superstitious 



THE PASSING BELL. 379 

during the sera of the Great Eebellioh. In a vestry- 
book belonging to the Chapel of All Saints, New- 
castle-upon-Tyne, the tolling of the bell is not men- 
tioned for twelve years, commencing in 1643. ^^^ 
did this disuse attach merely to a Passing Bell. The 
congregation of Forfar was summoned to Divine Ser- 
vice on Christmas-day, 1857, by the sound of church 
bells, heard for the first time since the year 1688. 

Of course, superstition, which has disfigured many 
of the most beautiful and interesting of human ordi- 
nances, perverted the true meaning of the Passing 
Bell ; and it became a belief among the illiterate 
that a consecrated bell has the power to drive away 
evil spirits. Thus they thought the bell was tolled 
to scare away the demons who were supposed to 
crowd the chamber of death, either to seize the soul 
of the dying man, or at least to terrify it on its pas- 
sage forth. 

This was the vulgar superstition which disfigured 
the originally beautiful custom of the Passing Bell, 
and probably led to its disuse. 

It is still a custom in many parts of England to 
make numeral distinctions according to the sex or 
quality of the person dying, as was formerly always 
usual. The bells were tolled twice for a woman, and 
thrice for a man ; if for a clergyman, as many times 
as he had orders, whilst a concluding peal on all the 



380 god's acke. 

bells told the hearers the quality of the person for 
whom they were thus reminded to pray, or, as others 
say, announced the death of the party. 

The 'Passing Bell,' as it is now most inappro- 
priately called, is, in these days, not tolled until after 
a person's death ; indeed I have myself, in late years, 
resided in a district where the custom was to toll it 
precisely twenty-four hours after that event. 

But long ago. Fuller writes thus : — 

' Hearing a Passing Bell, I prayed that the Sick 
Man might have, through Christ, a safe voyage to his 
long Home. Afterwards I understood that the Party 
was dead some hours before ; and it seems, in some 
places of London, the Tolling of the Bell is but a pre- 
face of course to the ringing it out. Bells better 
silent than thus telling Lyes. What is this but giving 
a false Alarme to Men's Devotions, to make them to 
be ready armed with their Prayers for the assistance 
of such who have already fought the good fight — yea, 
and gotten the Conquest ? Not to say that Men's 
Charity herein may be suspected of Superstition in 
praying for the Dead/ 

Thus its originally beneficial purpose, if not ren- 
dered quite nugatory, is yet divested of much of the 
solemnity and intensity of feeling which the idea 
would excite that you were yet in time to pray for 
your dying friend as well as for yourself. But how^ 



THE PASSING BELL. 38 1 

happy, how supremely blest in the ' peace which the 

world cannot give/ must he have been who, having 

' fought the good fight," having * kept the faith,' might 

(according to the pious Mr. Nelson) hear even his 

own Passing Bell without disturbance. 

Shakspeaxe, speaking of Hhe first bringer of un- 

welcome news," says — 

His tongue 
Sounds ever after as a sudden bell, 
Eemember'd knolling a departing friend. 

H.enry JF., Part ii. 

Yet shorn as it is of its intenser interest, the Pass- 
ing Bell can by few be heard with indifference, and 
it were no uninteresting task to record the various 
impressions caused by its tones — the selfsame tone — 
as its echoes are awakened to note the exit of the good 
or of the evil, of the young or of the aged, of the sordid 
and misanthropic, or the benignant and gracious. 

Take a few notes, recorded all in a very brief space 
of time, in my own immediate vicinage : — 

Tie * Passing Bell' tolls — it is surely a mistake, 
for all around is smiling and happy under the influ* 
ence of a refreshing and glorious day in early sum- 
mer. The hills look bright in the sunshine, and 
every face is radiant with cheerfulness and joy. 
Again it tolls, and the mourners, one by one, appear. 
There is no mistake ; the scarves are neatly pinned^ 



38:^ god's acre. 

the hatbands duly arrahged^^ and the beareis salute 
each other with cheerful alacrity, and descant in joy- 
ous terms on the unwonted brightness of the day. 
Groups of peasantry collect in various parts of the 
village, and they talk, and jeer, and bend their heads 
towards an object which seems to excite sarcastic 
merriment. The bell again tolls, and ere its sound 
has died away, a funeral train passes from the 
village. 

* Only look ! — only see \' says a white-haired man ; 
* she has taken nothing with her, not a thing. She 
has left everything behind, I do declare.' And thus 
the miser is taken to her long home. 

Again the Bell is tolled ; and high and low, rich 
and poor, proceed to the church in lengthened and 
orderly array ; for in extreme old age — ^many, many 
years beyond the ' threescore years and ten,* which 
the Psalmist points out as the term of human ex- 
istence — ^the widow is attended to the grave by a 
numerous oflfspring, reared in virtue after her ex- 
ample, and by a train of admiring friends of all ages 
by whom she was esteemed and loved. 



' The mourning in this county (which is always sent by the 
more respectable people) is a white linen scarf, worn by males 
as a hatband, and by females it is put round the neck, crossed 
over the bosom, and ^stened at the waist behind. 



THE PASSING BELL. 383 

When faiiih and love, which parted from thee never, 
Had ripen'd thy just soul to dwell with God, 
Meekly thou didst resign this earthly load 

Of death, call'd life, — ^which us from life doth sever : 

Thy works, and alms, and all thy good endeavour. 
Stayed not behind, nor in the grave were trod. 
But, as Faith pointed with her golden rod, 

FoUow'd thee up to joy and bliss for ever. 

Again the 'Passing Bell' is heard: its mournful 
echoes boom along the air, and rest on a threshold 
from which are about to be borne the mortal remains 
which shrouded a gentle spirit, youthful in years but 
long tried in suflfering. Commiserating tones are 
heard, and sympathizing looks glance aroimd, and 
even the accidental passenger treads more lightly as 
he steps by the porch, and turns a pitying look on 
the hardly conscious orphans led by stranger hands 
to their last surviving parent's tomb. 

* When the fatherless call upon thee, when the 
widow's heart is sunk, and she imploreth thine as* 
sistance with tears of sorrow, oh ! pity h^ affliction, 
and extend thy hand to those who have none to 
help them.' 

And why is the Passing Bell now mute ? Why is 
that knell now silent, which, if it point a moral on the 
death of the infirm and the aged^ must give the lesson 
double force when it indicates that death has closed 
the earthly career of the young, the beautiful ; — that 



384 OOD^S ACBE. 

the blossom is withered ere yet it is fully blown — ^that 
the bud of promise is broken ere yet it opened 
into fruit : — 

That ah, alas ! the almond bough, 
The olive branch is withered now/ 

No — the bell is mute ; for, at an untimely hour, in 
the darkness and stillness of the night, the little band 
of weeping friends attended the young and loving 
daughter and sister, stricken down by consumption, 
to her last resting-place. She was to be laid by her 
father's side, in his yet scarce-closed tomb ; and she 
had to be borne a many miles, and across a trea- 
cherous ford of ocean sand. At three o'clock in the 
morning the procession passed solemnly and suently 
away ; and when daylight came, had left no outward 
trace on the house of mourning to tell the passer-by 
of the desolation which reigned within. 

One reminiscence more. 

Death, in autumn, seems natural — at least it har- 
monizes with the sadness and decay of all around ; 
in winter it seems but a fitting accompaniment to the 
desolation which reigns over everything ; but in sum- 
mer, when the grasshopper chirps merrily in the grass 
— when the lark soars joyously to heaven — when the 
lamb gambols on the hill-side, and all nature seems 
animated and happy — then, indeed, do we feel the 



THE PASSING BELL. 385 

full terror of a decree which annouDces to us that 
^ death is come into the world/ 

Anfd so it was now. It was the very glory of the 
year, when the corn was ripening on the hills, and 
the early fruits were dropping from the bough ; when 
the roses were lingering ere the magnificent bouquet 
of autumn burst forth, and the birds hardly sought 
shelter in the night ; ere the ash had shed a leaf, or 
the lime flowers had lost their fragrance ; before the 
hue of the sycamore had turned, and while the husks of 
the horse-chestnut yet retained their vivid green ; when 
the sky gleamed with radiance, and the earth laughed 
in its beams, and hill and valley rejoiced and sang. 

Such was the season when on Sunday morning, at 
the accustomed part of the Service, our ofl&ciating 
clergyman announced that the * prayers of the con- 
gregation were desired for Bridget Heyton, for 
Gabriel Hailing (two aged sick parishioners), and for' — 
and he stopped, unable to proceed, and every eye in 
Church was raised in anxious and too certain antici- 
pation — ' and for' — ^with the utmost difficulty, choked 
with his own emotion, he at length half audibly 
enunciated the words — ' and for the Curate of this 
parish/ The remainder of the Service was almost 
inaudible; the reader could neither command his 
voice, nor quite repress his tears ; and many a half- 
smothered sob in the Church evinced the heartfelt 

c c 



386 god's acre. 

sympathy of the flock who felt they were about to be 
bereaved of a true and faithful shepherd. Some of 
the 'ancient fathers of the hamlet' left the Church 
and returned from time to time, bearing whispering 
messages to the officiating minister, and also com- 
municating them, but with all due decorum, to some 
members of the congregation around, but each whisper 
seemed to deepen the pervading gloom. 

The tale had nothing in it of the marvellous or un- 
common : it is a comparatively every-day occurrence. 
The Rev. Henry Medvill was our Curate : he was a 
young man of considerable literary attainments, and 
of the sincerest piety. He had devoted himself un- 
remittingly to the duties of his high and noble calling, 
and in the enthusiastic devotion of himself to them, 
had neglected the early warnings of the disease by 
which he was prostrated. HLs income too, being 
merely that of a Curate, unhelped by any private 
sources, did not suffice him for the generous wine and 
strengthening diet which his delicate frame demanded; 
ajid his own dinner, spare as it was, was frequently 
given to those poorer than himself, whilst he fasted 
the while. Of delicate and independent feelings too, 
his personal wants were not even suspected, and there 
is little doubt that his disease— KX)n8umption — was 
aggravated by the extreme abstinence which his ex- 
tensive charity imposed on him. Sufficiently well 



THE PASSING BELL. 387 

were his principles and habits known however to render 
him adored by the poor, and esteemed by the rich ; 
and could love, and prayers, and tears, and showering 
bounties have raised him from his sick bed, assuredly 
he would have been restored : but it was not to be. 

That evening, so still, so soft, so balmy, when hardly 
a zephyr stirred the air, and hardly the chirp of a 
bird occurred to break the spell ; when the last beams 
of the sun lingered an unwonted time above the 
horizon, as if loth to leave so lovely a scene, and the 
moon gleamed palely in the clear grey sky, where the 
silver stars were one by one appearing in dewy bright- 
ness — ^Uke angels, as we afterwards thought — ^like 
angels gathering to watch the death of the righteous ; 
then, as with my sister I paced the garden thoughir 
fully, the silence, which we had not cared to interrupt, 
was broken by a deep, low, and solemn knell which 
struck to our very hearts. After an interval of a 
minute it was repeated ; and softened and deadened as 
it was, coming to us over hill and dale for upwards of a 
mile — ^we could mistake it no longer, and we knew that 
our good Curate was at rest It was his Passing Bell 

From these and from many — ^how many soever 
other instances — ^the one brief but sufficing lesson given 
in the old couplet is to be adduced — 

When thou d6st hear a Toll or Knell, 
Then think upon thy Passing Bell. 

C C ^ 



CHAPTER XVI. 

MINISTERING SPIRITS. 

And there was one who said that he 
(Speaking in his simplicity) 
Had ofl heen here at dead of night. 
But yet no form had met his sight, — 
By that negation bringing nigh 
His secret deep expectancy ; — 
But that the midnight tombs around 
Strange floatings by were said to sound, 
And through the aislM stilbiess deep 
Strains indistinct were heard to sweep. 
Blest wisdom, dress'd in fancy's hue ! 
Such legends, if they be not true. 
Speak what our nature here divines 
'Mid holy sepulchres and shrines ! 

Baptistery. 

rpHERE is a sort of misgiving — ^not a fear, not an 
-^ apprehension, but an ' all-overishness' (as we once 
heard it elucidated) — ^which most persons experience 
in passing through a lonely churchyard at night. 
This nervousness is by no means confined to people of 
weak minds or evil conscience, but having its origin 
in the superstition inherent in our human nature, is 
more or less influencing on all. Very good and very 
sensible individuals have not hesitated to admit this 



L_ 



..1 LUiiiiHaH^BiM«^iaiv«w^)a««BPieo99KSB9an 



MINISTEBING SPIRITS. 389 

influence, even while blaming themselves for indulging 
it, and have entered entirely into the feelings of that 
belated schoolboy, who, 

With his satchel in his hand, 
Whistled aloud to keep his courage up. 

For it has been at all times a deep-seated feeling 

that burial-places are especially haunted by immaterial 

beings; and amongst pagan nations these were mostly 

considered to be of an inauspicious kind. The 

Umbra hovering about the tomb as if unwilling to 

quit the body, wa^, at least, an unhappy spirit; but 

the LarvcB roamed only for evil All youthful readers 

of the Arabian Nights have shuddered at the picture 

of the 

Ghoule of the East, with quick scent for the dead. 

In the Christian community the same superstition, 
modified, has always, generally, existed. But while 
it was believed that an evil spirit dared not even to 
approach the tomb of a holy man, it was also as 
firmly understood that the graves of murderers, sui- 
cides, and other criminals, and of unbaptized children, 
were thronged with dismal phantoms, rejoicing over 
the wicked dead, and most direful to the living. 

We have recorded elsewhere how usual was the 
solicitude of persons to be interred near holy people ; 
and also, in particular, the earnest and terrified en- 



390 GOD S ACRE. 

treaty of King John that he might be buried close to 
the grave of St. Wulstan, a Saxon Bishop, in the hope 
to shelter himself, beneath the sanctity of his neigh- 
bour in the tomb, from the horrors his wicked con- 
science made him too surely anticipate. 

At one time so strict were the laws on the subject, 
that malefactors were refused burial in consecrated 
ground ; even when these laws were modified, the 
churchyai'd in eodenso was not opened to them ; but 
into the north area only, were admitted the bodies 
of uubaptized children, persons excommunicate, sui- 
cides, and executed criminals. And of course, accord- 
ing to vulgar superstition, their unhallowed spirits 
would haunt their graves, and render that part of the 
churchyard obscene and horrible. And long after the 
belief in that superstition has passed away, the feel- 
ing generated by it remains ; as will be easily under- 
stood by those accustomed to explore old country 
churchyards. They will find but a scanty number 
of graves on the north side of many of them, com- 
pared with those on the south and east. Even the 
wise and learned Edmund Burke said — be his motive 
for the preference what it might — * I would rather 
sleep in the southern comer of a country church- 
yard, than in the tomb of the Capulets.' 

But it seems probable that the early appropriation 
of the northern parts of burial-places to those whose 



MINISTERING SPIRITS. 39 1 

ill lives had cast a shadow on the faith that is Id us^ 
originated in a tenet of deep and heartfelt importance 
in our early Church ; and if so, the desire to be 
buried as near the Holy Altar or East end of the 
Church as might be — though perhaps by many ac- 
counted a superstition — is a natural, pure, and holy 
wish, and rather deserving of reverence than ridicule. 
From the earliest period holy men of all climes have 
turned to the East to pray. Thus did Hezekiah; 
thus did Daniel. When the Magi journeyed in 
search of the Saviour, m the East shone the star 
which told of ' the young child's birth.' Paradise was 
to the eastward of the garden of Eden, and Adam on 
his transgression was driven, we are told, westward. 
There is a tradition that when our Saviour ascended 
from Mount Olivet, he was taken up eastward, and 
his disciples worshipped him that way. It is supposed 
also that on the cross his face was directed to the 
west, and therefore we pray turned to the East, that 
we may behold the face of Christ. 

In the early Church prayer was usually made 
towards the East, and the most ancient Basilicas 
were built always in the direction of the equinoctial 
East, for the sun was then supposed to rise over the 
seat of Paradise. 

St Augustine says — ' When we pray, we turn 
our faces to the East, from whence the day springs, 



39^ GOD S ACBE. 

that we may be reminded of turning to a more excel- 
lent Nature, namely, the Lord/ 

Cardinal Bona supposes that the origin of this 
custom was the idea that, as exiles, and pilgrims, we 
might turn towards the land whence we were ejected, 
to the terrestrial Paradise of Eden. St. Basil thinks 
that few are aware of this reason, though the Church 
has it in view to direct us to our ancient country. 
Justin Martyr considers that that part of the world 
was deemed most excellent and noble. But Christ 
being the true light and the tnie East, Saint Chrys- 
ostom says — 'Turning from the west, we look to- 
wards the East, expecting the omnipotent God.' 

The sun, the light and glory of the natural world 
— and the type of the ' Sun of Righteousness,' the 
illumination of the spiritual one — rises in the East ; 
and as commentators imagine that His second 
coming shall also be there — ^if it be a superstition, 
it is surely a most touching and reverential one, 
which has moved the humbly pious to wish to be 
there, even where Christ shall first appear in the 
clouds with great glory — ^there to be ready to meet him* 

* For as the lightning cometh out of the East, and 
shineth even unto the west ; so shall the coming of 
the Son of Man be.' 

There is, in all thoughtful moments, a pervading 




MINISTERING SPIRITS. 393 

impression on our minds — a sort of consciousness 
which no subtle reasoning will dispel — ^that, not in 
the churchyard only, but everywhere — 

Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 
Unseen, hoth when we sleep and when we wake ; 

and this, our constant uninterrupted connexion and 
company with higher intelligences, and the influence 
which these may have on our present welfare or 
future happiness, is a theme of deep and solemn in- 
terest, and may become, do we so school ourselves, 
one of intense consolation and hopa 

But it is difficult to realize the awful fact that we 
are never alone ; too difficult for human nature — as 
life itself would be too solemn for us, perhaps, were 
this fact always actively present. It is as much as 
our human faculties can bear, that the veil is occa- 
sionally raised for a short moment 

* A little lower than the angels !' We are, how- 
ever, taught to consider them as ever guarding us ; 
for St. Paul says — *Are they not all ministering 
spirits, sent to ^mi/nister to the heirs of salvation/ 
We do not indeed either see or hear them now ; but 
it is a common superstition, or fact, that not only are 
they always singing around us, but that babes when 
they are christened, and the righteous when they die 
— Itear them. 

* Whenever we look abroad,' says a modern erudite 



394 god's acbe. 

writer, 'we are reminded of those most gracious 
and holy beings, the servants of the Holiest, who 
deign to minister to the heirs* of salvation. Every 
breath of air and ray of light and heat, every 
beautiful prospect, is, as it were, the skirts of their 
garments, the waving of the robes of those whose 
faces see God in Heaven. 

'I can conceive,' continues he, 'persons saying all 
this is fanciful ; but if it appears so, it is only because 
we are not accustomed to such thoughts.' 

This constant ministry of angels, so deeply in- 
teresting and important to us, has, as we may suppose, 
received the earnest and solemn consideration of 
thoughtful, wise, and good men; but it has also 
formed a fruitful theme for those who have exhibited 
perhaps more ingenuity and subtlety than humility 
and reverence. There are extant copious disserta- 
tions on 

What iemions and classes be 

In the Celestiall Hierarchee ; 

In what degrees they are instated ; 

How 'mougst themselves concatinated. 

And here little has been left for the ingenuity of 
modern times to invent. No circumstance that can 
be imagined has been undiscussed ; not merely with 
regard to the numbers and orders of angels, but of 






MINISTERING SPIRITS. 395 

their form, their substance, their bodily presence, 
their intellect, their liability to sin, their language 
and mode of speech. 

Their numbers, in the researches of those, as we 
have intimated, more studious than reverent, have 
been variously calculated. Some have reckoned 
them, compared with mankind, as ninety-nine to 
one; and they bid us take comfort in the idea 
that the good most probably far exceed the evil 
angels in number. From Scripture we learn that the 
angelic hosts are innumerable ; and a modem learned 
writer says that in all probability the number of 
the human race past, present, and to come, may be 
as a drop in the bucket compared with the hosts of 
heaven. 

'Thousand thousands ministered imto him, and ten 
thousand times ten thousand stood before him/ 

By the collation of various texts of Scripture our 
forefathers have constructed a celestial hierarchy 
consisting of nine orders of angels (signified also, it 
has been said, by the nine precious stones wherewith 
Lucifer before his fall was adorned). These are 
Angels, Archangels, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, 
Dominations, Thrones, Cherubim, and Seraphim ; and 
to each of these classes were differing powers and 
duties ingeniously assigned. 

There is a legend that the celebrated Empress 



396 god's acbe. 

Helena, the discoverer of our Saviour's cross^ divided 
it iQto nine parts^ according to the nine orders of holy 
angel& 

Angels have been quaintly termed the 'Lieu- 
tenants, officers, soldiers^ and curators' of God. It 
was supposed that they were placed over the 
whole world to govern it in distributions assigned 
to them ; to look to nations and countries ; to pro- 
cure by active agency the common benefits of the 
fruits of the earth or rivers of water. As Heywood 
writes: — 

We spirits should in all things finde ; 
In Earth, in every Biyer, Brooke, and Fonntaine ; 
In Flood, in Well, in Yalley, Hill, and Moontaine ; 
In Plant, Herh, Grass, in Shrubs, in every Tree. 

Man was ever supposed to be an especial object of 
their cara The Pythagoreans, and since them the 
Mohammedans, held that every man had a good and 
a bad angel attending him ; the Egyptians, that every 
man had three. Some have thought that good and 
holy men have for their keepers angels of hght ; the 
bad, angels of darkness. But certainly it has been 
the most widely diffused opinion that each man had 
his tutelar or guardian angel constantly attending 
him. When the Apostle Peter had been miracu^ 
lously dehvered from prison, and appeared un- 
expectedly at the house where the disciples were 






MINISTERING SPIRITS. 397 

assembled in prayer, they said, 'It is his angel/ 
(Acts xii.) A celebrated dissenting minister has thus 
written on this passage: — 'We are sure that the 
angels are ministering spirits for the good of the 
heirs of salvation, that they have a charge concerning 
them — pitch their tents round about them — and we 
need not be solicitous that every particular saint 
should have his guardian angel, when we are assured 
that he has a guard of angels/ 

The term angel properly signifies a messenger, 
and is so rendered when applied to human agents in 
many passages of both Testaments ; but besides this 
general meaning, it is also and more frequently used 
to denote an order of created intelligences having 
faculties far more eminent than ourselves, and who 
are employed in executing the will of God in various 
parts of His creation. 

Not to dwell at this moment on the many angelic 
appearances recorded in Scripture, to Abraham, to Lot, 
to Manoah, to the Apostles in prison, and that detailed 
account of the ministry of the angel Baphael to the 
holy and merciful Tobit — we know that from the 
annunciation of his birth even unto his ascension 
into Heaven, no one remarkable circumstance of our 
Saviour's life occurred without the attendance and 
ministry of angels. 

The birth of his predecessor, John the Baptist, was 



398 god's acbe. 

announced by an angel to Zacharias ; the angel 
Gabriel revealed her maternity to the blessed Virgin ; 
angels sang in chorus the glad tidings of our Saviour's 
birth in the ears of the astonished shepherds. An 
angel guided Mother and Child in their flight from 
Herod ; angels ministered to Christ after his tempter 
tion in the wilderness, and wiped the bloody sweat 
from his brow during his agony in the garden. Angels 
announced his resurrection to the women at the 
sepulchre, and comforted his wondering disciples when 
they gazed as he was taken from them into Heaven. 

And shall we suppose that the Kedeemer would 
apportion to us, his weak and frail creatures, a smaller 
share of external aid than he himself experienced ? 
May we not rather indeed deem that the angels' 
ministry to our Saviour was rendered more con- 
spicuous as a testimony to assure us of heavenly 
sympathy and support ? 

'Are they not all ministering spirits' to us, and 
does not our Church in accordance with this tenet 
pray that the Almighty will mercifully grant that 
«as His Holy Angels do Him service in Heaven, 
SO by His appointment they may succour and de- 
fend us on earth V And that learned and orthodox 
commentator on the Book of Common Prayer, 
Wheatley, says that this feast (St. Michael and 
all Angels) is observed in order that the people 



MINISTERING SPIBITS. 399 

may know what benefits are derived from the mi- 
nistry of angek^ 

For oil do they their silver bowers leave 
To come to sucooar ns, that succour want ; 
And oft do they with golden pinions cleave 
The flitting skies, like flying poursuivant 
Against foul fiends, to aid us militant. 
They for us fight, they watch and duly ward. 
And their bright squadrons round about us plant. 

They never leave us. In sorrow they sympathize, 
in joy they rejoice, in prayer they unite with us ; and 
in sin, alas ! they behold us. In every varied scene 
of life, from the cradle to the grave, they are ever 
with us, to soothe us in affliction, to warn us from evil, 
to stimulate us to good, if we disregard not their 
admonitions. 

In what manner indeed these spiritual beings obtain 
access to our minds we cannot tell ; but since we are 
assured that evil spirits are permitted to excite us to 
bad thoughts and actions, there can be no reason to 
doubt that good spirits possess a similar power to- 



' A piece of poetry by Charles Lamb, called Angel Visits, 
was suggested by a picture, in which is represented the legend 
of a poor female Saint, who, having spun past midnight to 
maintain a bedridden mother, has fallen asleep from fatigue, and 
angeln are finishing her work. In another part of the chamber, 
an angel is tending a lily, the emblem of her purity. 



400 god's acre. 

wards us for good. *For the good angels of God,' 
says Bishop Bull^ ' shall go along with us in the 
whole course of our lives, never leaving us till they 
have safely landed us in a happy eternity. When 
we are in our extreme agony, these blessed spirits 
shall minister to us, as they did to our Saviour in 
his ; and when we breathe out our last, they shall 
watch our souls, that the wicked one may not touch 
them.' 

No one can carefully peruse the records of the 
dispensations of God towards our race, as contained 
in the Holy Scriptures, without perceiving that the 
Almighty usually, if not constantly and uniformly, 
makes use of these holy messengers to bring about 
whatever He would have done in this our lower 
world. There is scarcely any event recorded in the 
inspired pages, but it is distinctly affirmed to be 
brought about by the ministry of one or more of the 
angelic host When our first parents were expelled 
from Eden, Cherubims were placed at the gate to 
prevent their re-entrance to the scene of their past 
happiness. The histories of Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob, teem with instances of angelic intercourse. 
We learn from the light of the New Testament that 
angels were the agents made use of on the grand 
and solemn occasion of giving the Law from Mount 



L- 



MINISTERING SPIRITS. 401 

•Sinal^ -Again, the children of Israel were conducted 
by an angel through the wilderness to the Promised 
Land — 'And the angel of Qod which went before the 
camp of Israel removed and went behind them/ 
Again (Exod, xxxiii. i, 2) — ' And the Lord said unto 
Moses, Depart, go up hence .... I will send an 
angel before thee.' 

I have already referred to several of the very 
numerous appearances of angels throughout the his- 
torical books. An angel destroys the first-bom of 
Egypt — smites the people with a plague on ac- 
count of David's numbering the people — destroys 
the army of Sennacherib, &c. i an angel came down 
to disturb the waters at Bethesda, nor did the cripples 
attempt to lave in them uDitil this healing virtue was 
imparted by the act of the angel ; an angel opened 
the do<»rs of the Apostle's prison, &c. &c Quotations 
sufficient to prove that whatever Ood did in old time 
he did by means of an angel. 

Yes ; from the very beginning of time downwards 
angels have mingled in all man's history to this very 
hour : often visibly, as th^ foregoing instances ftilly 
prove ; always actually, though ^ under a veil' Since 
our Redeemer's presence in the flesh on earth, this 



* Bee Aets vii. 53 ; Hebrews ii. 3 ; compare also Psalm kviii. 1 7. 



402 god's acbk. 

veil is no longer remoyed at intervals^ as before was 
needful; but not the less do we irosi and believe that 
these holy ministrants are still and ever hovering on 
our path. 

What indeed is that ' strong-dding champion. Con- 
science/ but a pure and incorruplible spirit^ whose 
holy integrity of speech we may silence, but cannot 
gainsay — a ministering angel whispering truth to our 

hearts? 

Any firailty vanquished, any secret temptation over- 
come, the angels beholding, applaud; our internal 

« 

sbmggles unseen, undreamt of in the world, are fully 
known to them; every low-breathed prayer, eveiy sigh 
of contrition, every humble ejaculation of faith or hopet, 
is borne on golden pinions to the skies, and there 
emblazoned in all the vivid colouring of an angel's 
love. With meek and patient sorrow they note down, 
perforce, our deeds of sin ; with joy, with gladness, 
with i^^uiiant delight, they record, with pencil dipped 
in sunbeams, our feeblest aspirations after good. 

And where these aspirations, however feeble, how- 
ever transient and effectless, might be supposed to be 
most earnest, most energetic — ^IN the House of Qod 
— there are we emboldened to believe that the angels 
most especially congregata ^ Holy places^' says 
Bishop Jeremy Taylor, * being the residence of Qod's 




MINIStEBIKQ SPIBITS. 403 

name upon earthy there where He hath put it, that 
by fiction of law it may be the sanctuary and the 
last resort in all calamities and need, God hath sent 
His agents to possess them in person for Him. 
Churches and oratories are regions and courts of 
angels. And they are there not only to minister to 
the saints, but also they possess them in the right of 
God.' St. Chrysostom wrote^' The church is not 
a shop of manufactures or merchandise, but the 
place of augels and of archangels, the court of God, 
and the image and representation of heaven itself.^ 

More especially does this apply to them during 
the celebration of the Eucharist. An old bishop of 
the Church has written — * In this givinge of thankes 
by Christ our Lorde, for whose merites they be only 
acceptable, the priest prayeth to be joyned and asso- 
ciate with the aungels and archaungels, and all the 
whole army of the blessed spirites in heaven, who 
then doo aaaiat the PHeste, and he present there in 
the honour of Hym who is offered, praysynge, 
honoring, and adoringe the Majestic of Ahnightye 
Ood.' 

So in the Hymn Ter Sanctus we say — * Therefore, 
with Angels and Archangels, and with all the com* 
pany of heaven, we laud and magnify Thy glorious 
name.' 



404 god's acbb. 

■ Thia understood and acknowledged tenet that 
wherever there is a congr^^atiou of Christians 
aaaembled for the worship oi Gbd, there is likewise a 
comipany ot gloripu9angels> explains that remarkable 
passage of St PaHl (i Car. xL 10) — ' For this cause 
oaght the woman to have power on her head becaaee 
of the angels / when he urges them to observe a 
modesty of dress and demeanour on account of these 
spiritual visitants. Hence the regulaticm, firom that 
day to our own, that no modest woman shall enter 
church with her head uncovered. 

Finally, when the last solemn hour draws nigh, 
when time for us is done, when prayer and adora- 
tion on earth are over, and the power of deprecation 
is fast passing away, when the dust retumeth to 
earth as it was, and the spirit ascendeth to God who 
gave it — then, at the bed of death, angels do most 
especially minister. 

'It came to pass that the beggar died, and was 
carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom.' 

We will not enter the chamber of the wicked 
man, where — their hopes quenched, their ministry 
unavailing-M;he guardian angels fold their wings and 
weep; but with reverent feet we will approach the 
holy band assembled at the couch of the expiring 
Christian. 



MINISTEBINO SPIRITS. 405 

There, during that fearful strife which is bo fre- 
quently the forerunner of diiiaolution, when, trem- 
bling and dismayed, the departing spirit shrinks be- 
neath the stem conflict^ and feelig^r-oh, how bitterly 1 
— ^the ineffable emptiness of all this world can be- 
stow — ^the heavenly messenger whispers of faith, of 
hope, of comfort, in that Divine expiation made for 
all sin. 

The struggle passes away^ The Christian pilgrim, 
his frailties forgiven, his wanderings o'er, nxeekly 
resigns himself to his Maker's hands; his spirit, 
hovering between two worlds, assumes somewhat of 
prophetic strain ere yet disencumbered of its earthly 
coil ; with all the dignity of sanctity, with all the 
solemn majesty of Death, he bequeaths around him 
warnings, and blessings, and prayers; and, straining 
to that crown of glory which now shines vividly 
before his purified eye, his immortal part is borne 
by triumphant angels to heaven, amid the acclama- 
tions of myriads who throng the peopled air. 

And though 

Whilst this muddy vestare of decay 
Doih grossly close us in, we cannot hear them, 

still are we not left comfortless. The stricken 
mourner — the desolate widow — ^the bereaved mother 
— the sorrowing daughter — ^hangs in deep but not in 



4o6 god's agrk 

hapden angoisli over the inanimate farm; liar, in 
this momait <^ dismay, the miniderimg OfngeL, 
toadied with the feeling of oar infirmities^ breathes 
in a tone of inexpressible oomfcMrt : — 

'The sool of the righteous is in the hand of God, 
and there shall no torment toodi him. 

' In the fflght of the anwiae he seemed to die ; and 
his departore is taken for misery. 

'And his going from as to be otter destruction : 
hot — Ha is nr feacb/ 



THE END. 



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